You've Got to Hide Your Love Away
by Quatermass
Summary: Events lead to Dr Snyder, Angel, and a few comrades being stranded in the remote town of Oasis. Being drawn into a hunt for a legendary treasure is bad enough. Being hunted down by Handsome Jack is worse, especially when he is determined to imprison his daughter once more, and murder anyone who dared defy him, especially Dr Snyder... (Book 2 of The Ballad of Ricky and Angel)
1. Foreword

**FOREWORD**

I was surprised at how well my first _Borderlands 2_ fanfic, _Hooked on a Feeling_ , turned out. What started as a near-self-insert fic became enjoyed by more than I thought. In fact, by the point I got these reviews, I decided to change the ending.

The original ending I had in mind for _Hooked on a Feeling_ had Snyder kill Jack during the confrontation in the Angel Bunker, save Angel, and take over Hyperion, all to live happily ever after. Real life doesn't work like that, and frankly, it was better to end it a different way. After some thoughts, I was hit by inspiration. I had wanted Snyder to travel to the locations of various DLCs, and I actually thought, given that Snyder tells Jack that he's eloping with Angel, why not to Oasis? Oasis is not unlike a smaller scale Las Vegas on Pandora, maybe they have been famed, like Vegas, for quick and easy weddings and honeymoons. And that's how Snyder gets caught up in the events of _Captain Scarlett and Her Pirate's Booty_. Or at least that was how it began. The story of _Hooked on a Feeling_ showed otherwise...

Doctor Richard Snyder grew as a character in _Hooked on a Feeling_ , becoming less cowardly, and perhaps less judgemental of others, or at least of most. I think now is the time for him and Angel to grow together as characters. Free from her prison, Angel is going to spread her wings in more ways than one.

That being said, it won't just be about Snyder and Angel. Gaige and Krieg come along for the ride, as does Tiny Tina and Tim Lawrence. And other characters from the _Borderlands_ series will still make an appearance, including a surprise appearance by a most unwelcome guest…

The title comes from the Beatles song. The reason why I chose it is because A), it suits Snyder and Angel's status as fugitives from Jack's wrath, and B), it was covered by a band called Oasis. And considering that this story is set partially in a town called Oasis, well…

Now for the disclaimers. Firstly, as is usual for my fanfics, there will be annotations. Don't like, don't read.

Secondly, the M-rating is there for a reason, people. There'll be violence, swearing, and even some sex if you're lucky.

Thirdly, remember that this is, to a degree, a self-insert fic. If you don't like it, you may go now.

Fourthly, I haven't played the original game or the Pre-Sequel, or the _Tales from the Borderlands_ games. I will endeavour to include elements from those, but please forgive any screw-ups.

Fifthly, there will be character splashes. I will endeavour to make them as awesome as they are in the game.

Finally, the following is a fan-written work. The _Borderlands_ series is the property of 2K Games, Gearbox, and whoever else I have failed to mention. The song lyrics and quotes are the property of their respective owners. Please, support the official release.

"HEYOOOO!"

Yes, Steve, I know you bought copies of the games. You're better than Claptrap in that regard…

 ** _Previously on_** **The Ballad of Ricky and Angel…**

 _When he was six, Richard Snyder was virtually friendless. He was considered a freak by many, because he had a condition, the Super Cognitive Interpretation Zone (or Sci-Zone for short), a condition that, when triggered, sent him into what can only be described as 'mad scientist mode'. His first real friend, outside his family, was a girl by the name of Angel. He became fascinated by her, not least because she was a Siren, one of a rare group of female humans with special powers. However, when he was eight, Angel disappeared, and her father, a man by the name of John, refused to say what happened._

 _Richard Snyder grew up, and eventually trained to become a biologist, gaining a doctorate. His unofficial specialty, his obsession, even, was with Sirens. But he was ever haunted by his curse. He began to work for John, now going by the name of Jack, and later, Handsome Jack, the head of the Hyperion Corporation. But Richard never forgot Angel, a lost friend. And she never forgot him._

 _Angel sent a message to Richard to let him know she was still alive, but Handsome Jack caught wind of it. By coincidence, he was coaxing Vault Hunters to work for him as part of a plot to get them to do his dirty work, as well as thin out those opposing him. Paranoid that Richard would find out the truth about Angel, he tricked Richard into becoming his liaison with one group of Vault Hunters, using one of them, the Siren Maya, as an incentive._

 _However, Snyder and the Vault Hunters survive the trap Jack set for them. Wary of him, the Vault Hunters decide to let Snyder tag along, despite his cowardice. He proves his mettle, however, in a fight to the death against some tenacious bandits, when the Sci-Zone is unleashed._

 _The Vault Hunters and Snyder eventually make it to Sanctuary, taunted by Jack along the way, and guided by Angel. Only Snyder knows that Angel is not an artificial intelligence, but a Siren hooked up to Pandora's computer networks. She warns him to keep the information secret, as Jack will redouble his efforts to murder Snyder, as well as anyone else who knows._

 _At Sanctuary, Snyder is treated with suspicion for being a former Hyperion employee. And when they try to follow a lead to track down Roland, former Vault Hunter and leader of the Crimson Raiders, the resistance against Jack, it nearly gets Snyder killed. They find the Firehawk, a bounty hunter and vigilante who turns out to be former Vault Hunter and Siren Lilith, who turns on Snyder. However, they join forces to beat off an attack by bandits, and while the Vault Hunters go to rescue Roland, Lilith sends Snyder to babysit Tiny Tina, as a test of character, one that Snyder manages to pass._

 _Back at Sanctuary, Roland, Lilith and Snyder get into an argument regarding Angel (who had unwillingly betrayed the former Vault Hunters before) and a vague warning from her about a plot against Sanctuary. Snyder storms out, only for Lilith to intercept him, and begin asking him about Angel and his past. He unintentionally lets slip enough clues that Lilith guesses the truth. Lilith, Roland, and Snyder share this information, with the former two beginning to understand that Handsome Jack's depravity knows no limits. And their opinion of a woman they thought betrayed them begins to change._

 _Learning that the Vault Key might be transported by train, the Vault Hunters, accompanied by Snyder, assault the train, only to be ambushed by Wilhelm, a powerful cyborg that the first Vault Hunters and Snyder have encountered before. Snyder is about to be murdered by Wilhelm when Wilhelm is dispatched by Zer0, one of the latest Vault Hunters. A special power core is found nearby, and is taken back to Sanctuary. However, Snyder, along with some of the Vault Hunters, are perturbed at how easy Wilhelm fell, and how oddly he acted during the fight. Snyder discovers too late that Wilhelm was drugged during the fight. Jack's trap is sprung: the power core was a booby-trap, designed to allow Angel to hack Sanctuary's shield systems._

 _As Jack tries to turn Sanctuary into rubble, Lilith and Roland implement a desperate plan: to turn Sanctuary into a floating city, as well as to use Lilith's abilities, boosted by Eridium, to get it out of the line of fire. The plan succeeds, but in the aftermath, Snyder is attacked by angry citizens of Sanctuary. Unconscious, he speaks to Angel once more via a special link that she set up. She is being used by Jack to charge the Vault Key, in order to open a new Vault, containing a gigantic alien warrior known as the Destroyer. She is determined to die, and is certain that nothing can save her. In trying to dissuade her, though, Snyder alienates her._

 _Later, once Snyder is conscious again, he ends up with Lilith as Angel contacts them in Sanctuary, giving them intelligence on how to reach her Control Core where she is kept, and to kill her. Inspired by a turn of phrase Angel uses, however, Snyder formulates a plan that might just keep her alive, using a device of Dr Tannis', and Maya and Lilith's Siren abilities._

 _After a series of adventures, Vault Hunters old and new assault the Control Core Angel complex. After many battles, they make it to Control Core Angel proper. Fighting off Jack's defences, the group of fighters finally win, with Snyder managing to get Angel back to Sanctuary, and into a life-support tank. The other Vault Hunters manage to escape with the Vault Key, and with Handsome Jack swearing vengeance._

 _Angel, thinking she has been confined to the life-support tank forever, berates Snyder for caging her again instead of letting her die as she wanted. Snyder, however, reveals that he thought of that: with the help of Dr Zed, Angel only needs a portable Eridium injector to survive. Angel is elated._

 _The cost of liberating Angel was high. And the war hasn't been won. Jack, deciding that he doesn't need either Angel or any of the other Sirens, begins attacking Sanctuary once more. As Lilith prepares to use her Phasewalk again to shift the city, Snyder and Angel, along with Vault Hunters Krieg and Gaige, Tiny Tina, and a former body-double of Jack called Timothy Lawrence, end up falling out of the city. But what was supposed to be a long fall to their deaths turns into a teleportation when they are caught by the backlash of Lilith's Phasewalk. They end up sprawled on the ground, just outside a town called Oasis, which is suffering from a crisis of its own…_


	2. Chapter 1: Thunderbolts and Lightning

**CHAPTER 1:**

 **THUNDERBOLTS AND LIGHTNING, VERY VERY FRIGHTENING ME**

 _We landed roughly on sandy ground. Tim was the first to recover, getting to his feet, and rubbing the back of his head. "What the hell just happened?" he asked._

 _I looked around. The rocky, arid landscape was far from familiar. It didn't seem like the Dust or the Arid Nexus. You could see, just, in the sky, the ever-present satellite, and the moon. So we were still on Pandora. "I dunno. I guess when we fell, Lilith activated her Phasewalk on Sanctuary. But because we were falling from it, it didn't work for us. Good thing too. We'd be falling through the air by now."_

 _"But where's Sanctuary?" Gaige demanded._

 _"Where's Roland?" Tina said, her bulging eyes wide._

 _"Gone," Angel said quietly. "Just a moment. Phase-shift activated." Her eyes glowed briefly, and then, she nodded. "I've just cleaned out our ECHO devices. Dad can't track us, for now. On the plus side, I know where we are. The GPS data is out of date, but we're near Oasis."_

 _"Oasis?" I frowned. I had heard of the place, vaguely. It was noted for being at the edge of a desert, albeit one that had once been a small inland sea. Sandworms of various kinds were common near there, nasty things that spat acid. Stalkers were also common there, the creatures that could cloak themselves._

 _"Yeah. Sanctuary's ECHO link is down, though. We're on our own until it's back up."_

 _I looked around, and spotted a familiar terminal just up a hill. "Isn't that a Fast Travel station?"_

 _"Yes. Give me a moment. Phase-shift activated." Once more, her eyes glowed blue. "Nothing. The data on it is corrupted. I'll send a message to Sanctuary with the station's code, but they'll have to use it. Hopefully, they'll get the message once their ECHO link is back up. Let's get some weapons and ammo from the vending machines."_

 _"Yeah, don't know when we'll be making new friends around here," I muttered._

* * *

 _Soon, thanks to what money we had, we were armed once more. Tina was clutching a large box of grenades like her life depended on it. Angel now had a sniper rifle. I had gone armed back at Sanctuary, so I still had my Maliwan pistol, the Maliwan SMG Maya gave me, and my shield grenades. Krieg had a Torgue pistol. Tim was already armed, his bracelets capable of firing lasers. I thought that ridiculously cool._

 _Any further thoughts on the subject were blasted away with an ECHOnet broadcast. I frowned when I realised that it was nearby, at Oasis. The nervous-sounding voice of a man emanated from the speaker. "_ Welcome to my lovely town of Oasis, strangers! _" said the voice. A photo accompanying the message showed a man with large sunglasses, a floppy hat, a once-garish colourful shirt faded by desert heat, and…was that a cigarette holder in his mouth?_

 _I frowned. Was it me, or did he look like a Hunter S Thompson fanboy? The ID below marked him as 'Shade'._

 _"_ Now, could you please SAVE ME FROM THE FILTHY SAND PIRATES TRYING TO STEAL MY WATER?! _"_

 _I blinked, and then stared up ahead. A prominent and elegant sign said, Welcome to the Oasis. A number of buildings lay in the distance, while nefarious figures, clearly not inhabitants, skulked through the streets. Hanging off the edge of a cliff in the distance was the rear end of a large boat. Not an intended holiday destination._

 _I stared at the sand pirates, who had now begun to advance on us, having spotted us. And I turned to the heavens, and screamed, "Once, just once,_ _ **CAN I GET A FUCKING BREAK?**_ _"_

My appeal to the heavens, and to whatever cruel god or gods watch over Pandora, went unheeded. Big surprise there. Instead, a hail of gunfire spat in our direction. We dove for cover wherever we could, save for Krieg, who surged forward, his buzz-axe in hand, screaming a berserker scream.

 **KRIEG AS**

 **THE PSYCHO  
**

 **Empty Vessels Make a Lot of Noise. Crazy Ones Even More So.**

I pitied the sand-pirates. While 'unstoppable' was not an adjective I would use lightly, it probably applied to Krieg in the depths of a berserk rampage. Nothing short of an anti-tank round could stop him. And even then, it might not do the trick.

Tim sent out his doppelgangers, digistructed simulacra of the man whom he was a body double of, Handsome Jack. "I'll drown you in a sea of chiselled jaws!" he yelled out.

 **TIMOTHY LAWRENCE AS**

 **JACK'S DOUBLE  
**

 **Looks Like Handsome Jack, But Ain't a Douche**

"To hell with the First Law!" Gaige yelled, summoning Deathtrap, and sending him to support the Psycho and Tim's doppelgangers.

 **GAIGE AS**

 **THE MECHROMANCER  
**

 **Got Third Place at the Science Fair. She'll Show You Why She Deserved First.**

"Try my pineapple salad, bitches!" Tina screamed, throwing grenades at our enemies with frightening accuracy and frequency. Not for nothing I thought of her as Pandora's deadliest thirteen-year old.

 **TINY TINA AS  
**

 **THE DEMOGIRL**

 **Cute. Endearing. Nucking futs.**

Popping out from behind cover, I began spraying the sand pirates with the Maliwan SMG Maya gave me just before we entered Liar's Berg. It felt like years ago, but it can't have been more than a few weeks at best. Time passed weirdly on this planet, especially when you're fighting for your life. I was still a scarecrow of a guy, and a coward. Lean, but not mean, and no fighting machine. At least I thought I was. Then again, when you have the Sci-Zone, you can be pretty deadly, even on a planet where being deadly is the norm. And when it came to Angel, I did what was considered impossible, even by her standards.

 **DOCTOR RICHARD SNYDER AS  
**

 **THE MAD SCIENTIST**

 **Full-Time Siren Scientist, Part-Time Mad Genius, Casual Dresser**

Angel soon joined me and Gaige in firing upon our adversaries. Like Gaige, Angel was using a sniper rifle from a distance to pick off enemies. Between the five of us, the sand pirates were soon decimated. Or so we thought as we warily ventured into Oasis. Suddenly, one of the ruffians, who had been in hiding, suddenly reached out and grabbed Angel, his arm snaking around her throat. Another one shot at us, and Gaige, Tina and I had to dive for cover. Krieg was elsewhere in the town, hacking merrily away at the corpse of one of his victims.

"Give up, or the girl gets it!" the sand pirate holding Angel hostage snarled. "Drop your goddamn weapons!"

As I made to do so, I saw a blue glow appear in Angel's eyes. Some instinct inside screamed at me. "Down!" I yelled at Gaige and Tina, diving to the ground. Krieg didn't heed me, but then again, he was far enough away.

Suddenly, a loud _BANG!_ assaulted our eardrums. Blue light seared at our eyelids. And when it was over, the sand pirate holding Angel was convulsing and juddering, smoke rising from his cooking flesh.

As he slumped to the ground, dead, Angel put her hand out in a halting gesture. The last surviving sand pirate's eyes widened. "What the _fu..?!_ " Unfortunately for him, those were his last words.

With another deafening _BANG!_ , a bolt of lightning arced across and hit the sand pirate, who exploded in a shower of half-cooked gore.

I got to my feet shakily, only to see Angel begin to sag, her eyes dulling. I caught her as I fell. "Angel!" I yelled. I fumbled for the injector, and pressed the 'boost' button. Angel gasped, her eyes refocusing. The boost button was a standard feature of the drug injector, and I was glad of it, just in case Angel needed a temporary high dose of Eridium.

"Holy _shit_ ," Angel muttered. "That was…interesting."

 **ANGEL AS  
**

 **THE SIREN**

 **Alis Volat Propriis(** **1)**

"Thunderbolts and lightning," Gaige muttered. "Very very frightening me.(2)"

Tiny Tina's usually bulging eyes had gone from Tom Baker level to Marty Feldman level(3). "Dayum, Angel. That was awesome! What was that?"

Angel stared at her hands. "Well, apparently I can use lightning. Huh."

"Huh?! You just shot a fucking thunderbolt at people, and that's all you can say?!" Tim yelped, his eyes wide.

"AND SHE STRIKES, LIKE THUNDERBALL!(4)" Krieg offered his usual wisdom.

I, meanwhile, stared. My mind was whirling, trying to make sense of this. How could she suddenly fire off bolts of lightning? Suddenly, something clicked. "Electricity," I muttered, almost in shock. Pun unintended.

"Electricity?" Gaige asked.

"Well, think about it!" I snapped. "Angel's abilities, to date, revolved around manipulating electronics, right? Maybe she has some control over electrical charge at a subatomic level. This is just what happens when you sacrifice the precision of manipulating electronics for raw power."

Angel looked at me, and then at her hands. "Well, I guess that's as good an explanation as any."

The moment was spoiled when Shade called up again. " _Thank you so very much, my friends! Yes, yes yes yes! Now that the water is safe, let us talk in person. Like people._ "

Not long afterwards, another ECHO transmission came up, with the avatar being a red-haired woman in what could only be described as a pirate outfit, albeit with a special vision-enhancing monocle instead of an eyepatch. The handle displayed was Captain Scarlett. " _What IS that ruckus coming from Oasis? Oh…are you Vault Hunters?_ " Her voice had what sounded like a fairly posh British accent.

"Most of us," I said. "I guess my girlfriend and I count by default, and the others are." Given how many times Roland said Tina saved his life, I guessed she counted as one. An impish thought occurred to me. "Have you been fighting Mysterons?"

"… _What's a Mysteron?_ (5)" Scarlett asked. " _Never mind. I'm Captain Scarlett, and something tells me that you're here for the treasure, same as I am._ "

"Treasure?" I asked, a question echoed by the others.

" _The treasure of Captain Blade, of course!_ "

Now this was interesting. I had heard a few of the tales of Captain Blade, an infamous pirate captain who had been around these parts. And judging by the way the others reacted, they had heard the legends too.

" _If you're not here for the treasure, why are you here?_ "

"We're here by accident," Angel said. "It's a very long story."

" _Hang on…that voice is very familiar. Aren't you that girl, the Guardian Angel who sometimes appears on the ECHOnet?_ "

Angel sighed. "I'm told I sound a lot like her."

" _Huh. How about that? Anyway, maybe if you want, we could look for the treasure ourselves and split it up. Or kill each other. Or maybe both! If you want to meet me, come to my ship in Wurmwater. Be seeing you!_ " And with that, delivered in a cheerful, chipper tone, she cut off the connection.

Left bemused, we looked around at our surroundings. The town had clearly been originally built as a seaside resort, with piers leading out into now non-existent water. The buildings had clearly seen better days. Then again, so had the townsfolk. Not only were the sand pirates not the sole cadavers around the place, but the corpses of the townsfolk were…arranged. Many of them had loudspeakers attached or near them.

"Why do I get the feeling that we've just stumbled upon a horror movie?" I groaned.

"You're not the only one," Angel said, her eyes narrowing.

"Creepy, or what?" Gaige said.

Tim only nodded, looking queasy. I knew he had shot people, being one of Jack's own Vault Hunters on Elpis, but still, he had limits. I wondered if that was what a queasy Handsome Jack looked like?

Tina, however, had skipped over to one of the corpses, and was poking at a semi-desiccated leg. "Squishy. Squishy squishy squishy."

"Tina, that's unhygienic!" Angel warned.

"WASH YOUR HANDS WITH STALE URINE AFTER EVERY MEAL!" Krieg bellowed.

Note to self: never shake hands with Krieg. Not that I was ever in a hurry to in the first place, of course, but still, that comment, despite the dubious veracity, had me wondering about Krieg's sense of personal hygiene.

"Over here!" came the voice of Shade, though this time, not over ECHOnet. It came from a rather ratty place called 'Kitty Kream', possibly once an ice-cream store. Like much of the surroundings, however, it had gone to seed.

The shutter that closed it up was opened, and Shade appeared. In person, he was even more weird. I realised that the thing in his mouth wasn't a cigarette holder, but a bottle rocket! Even by Pandora standards, that seemed dangerous. He had a big gap in his teeth where one was missing, and his smile seemed too much like someone who had been partaking of the Joker's poisons.

"I am Shade," he said, introducing himself, "and you, yes, YOU are officially the coolest people I have ever met!" He clasped his hands together pleadingly. "Please, don't go. Please?"

 **SHADE**

 **Pandora's Answer to Norman Bates(** **6)**

I looked at Angel, and her eyes met mine with the same expression. What the _fuck_ have we gotten ourselves into this time?

 **CHAPTER 1 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **Welcome to the first chapter of** ** _You've Got to Hide Your Love Away_** **. It picks up right where** ** _Hooked on a Feeling_** **leaves off. Which isn't surprising. The last bits of** ** _Hooked on a Feeling_** **were derived from the original version of this chapter. It felt weird writing that first chapter before I finished** ** _Hooked on a Feeling_** **. I had to change a lot (how Snyder, Angel, and the others got to Oasis was different, for example), but some stuff ultimately worked.**

 **Angel was always going to survive** ** _Hooked on a Feeling_** **. In fact, part of the point of the story was to engineer a scenario (without using a New-U Station, anyway) where she could survive the events of** ** _Borderlands 2_** **. Even before I wrote it, I knew of the events that happened in the mission** ** _Where Angels Fear to Tread_** **, despite having not gotten that far. Playing that mission did help me write the chapters set during that, though, but Angel was always meant to survive, though bringing Tim into the story was a surprise.**

 **So, both Tiny Tina and Angel have Action Skills now. I'll explain them. First, Tiny Tina. In** ** _Hooked on a Feeling_** **, I compared Tina to Ace, the explosives-obsessed companion of the Seventh Doctor from** ** _Doctor Who_** **. In honour of Ace, and one of her finest moments, I am naming Tina's Action Skill after one of Ace's lines from Remembrance of the Daleks. Ace beats the crap out of a Dalek with a baseball bat, albeit a baseball bat enhanced by a Time Lord weapon. But just before that, said Dalek destroys her tape-deck, and then squawks "Small human female sighted on Level 3!" Ace yells back, "** ** _WHO'RE YOU CALLING SMALL?!_** **" So that's the name of Tina's Action Skill:** **Who're You Calling Small?** **It's a bit like Salvador's Gunzerking, but she spams grenades, a bit like a skill I think Krieg has when he's dying.**

 **Angel's Action Skill is called** **Shock and Awe** **. It unleashes a series of massive electrical attacks that damage or kill the enemy, and will harm any enemy that tries to melee her. I actually had to think hard about what her Action Skill was, and I used the same rationale as Snyder to explain it. Because Angel can manipulate electronics, she must have some effect over electrons in some manner or other. I thought, if you brought that up to another level, sacrificing the fine control for sheer power, well, you got basically lightning. Of course, it's very draining on her and her supply of Eridium.**

 **EDIT: I've added some changes to the character splashes, as these people will be the 'player characters' for this story. So too will some others coming up.**

 **Anyway, I'll answer any leftover reviews from** ** _Hooked on a Feeling_** **in the next chapter. Now, onto the numbered annotations.**

 **1\. Appropriately, the motto for Angel's character splash here is 'She flies with her own wings'.**

 **2\. This quote, and the chapter, comes from Queen's famous** ** _Bohemian Rhapsody_** **.**

 **3\. Tom Baker is most famous for playing the Fourth Doctor (he of the bulging eyes, scarf, and curly hair) in** ** _Doctor Who_** **. Marty Feldman was a famous comedian who had distinctively bulging eyes that were crooked. One of Feldman's most famous roles was as Igor in** ** _Young Frankenstein_** **, though he also appeared alongside later Monty Python members John Cleese and Graham Chapman, and the later Goodies member Tim Brooke-Taylor, in** ** _At Last the 1948 Show_** **.**

 **4\. Krieg, of course, is yelling a modified version of the lyrics to** ** _Thunderball_** **, the theme of the James Bond film of the same name, and sung by Tom Jones (who fainted after singing the final note, believe it or not!).**

 **5\. I'm sure that Captain Scarlett's name is a reference to the Gerry Anderson series** ** _Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons_** **, one of Gerry Anderson's puppet series. It was remade as a CGI series relatively recently.**

 **6\. Norman Bates was one of the key characters in** ** _Psycho_** **. When you compare Shade to him, then you begin to wonder how those townspeople ended up the way they did…**


	3. Chapter 2: Siren Song

**CHAPTER 2:**

 **SIREN SONG**

It had been decided to rest up before leaving Oasis. Despite our distrust of Shade, I managed to confirm one thing upon examining the corpses. It looked like Dartnell's Dehydration, a kind of short-lived but highly contagious and lethal illness that killed people by rapid dehydration. Shade was very lucky: he was either immune, or survived the illness. If it was the latter, I guess that explained some of his insanity. My specialty was in Eridium, but exotic illnesses were an interest. I had, after all, formulated a cure for skull-shivers shortly after my parents died of the same illness. In my grief, I slipped into the Sci-Zone. That being said, water supplies in Oasis were dangerously low.

It was decided that Angel and I would share a room in the motel, Krieg by himself, and Gaige, Tim, and Tina in a third room. After a meal, we retired to our respective rooms.

As Angel showered (thankfully, it was a sonic unit rather than one that used water), I sat down at the desk of the room, which had a yellowed piece of paper, and an ancient, but working, pen. I began, partly to organise my thoughts, and partly to calm myself down given the situation, to write down what I knew of Sirens.

 _What we know of Sirens_ , I wrote, _is surprisingly little. Then again, they are exceedingly rare. According to lore, only six of them may exist at any one time._

 _So, what do I know about them? Well, they're all female. They all are slender and beautiful, almost inhumanly so, with pale skin. They seem to have tattoo-like markings, though I will get back to the peculiarities of those in a moment. They seem to have a tendency, in both physiognomy and dress, to be asymmetrical. They all have powers, which vary between individual Sirens. Eridium seems to boost their powers, and as Jack's use of Angel with the Vault Key showed, Sirens can boost the powers of Eridium. With the exception of Angel, they generally have an overtly noticeable difference to coloration of the hair, and/or eyes. During extreme use of their powers, 'wings' of energy appear from their backs._

 _Frustratingly, very little else is known. Some of what is currently known (and wasn't derived from scientifically and morally dubious experimentation) was derived from an autopsy of the corpse of Helga Steele, former Commandant of the Crimson Lance, turned into a cyborg creature during the Claptrap revolution. It was learned that, throughout the body, there were cells, which, because they were demonstrated to have high levels of Eridium in novel organelles, were called Eridicytes. These cells seem to be a strange mix of neural cell, muscle cell, and tumour cell (the latter because Eridicytes have many properties similar to neoplastic or cancerous cells, including lengthy telomeres)._

 _The tattoos are actually what shows on the skin of…well, at least one person is calling it an organ. That's debatable nomenclature, but let's call it that for sake of an argument. I will dub it the Phase-Organ, as all Siren abilities seem to be prefixed with the word 'phase'. The Phase-Organ has the highest concentration of Eridicytes in a Siren's body, and is part of the focus of their power. When they use their powers, the tattoo-like markings glow. The Phase-Organ actually runs throughout the Siren's body, with part of it reaching into the brain._

 _Hmm, note to self: look at Fast Travel station data of Lilith and Maya, along with New-U data of the latter (Lilith told me she was locked out of the New-U system by Jack. I wonder if I can get Angel to reverse that?). The data might prove vital to understanding a living Siren._

 _I will list the four Sirens I personally know to exist or have existed, quirks of appearance, as well as their abilities if known._

 _Commandant Helga Steele (deceased): White hair and pale eyes. Looked like an albino of sorts. Powers unknown. NOTE: When a Siren dies (and isn't resurrected by the New-U machine), how long until another is born? Do they share the same abilities as their predecessor? Is Steele's successor already born somewhere in the cosmos? Is that whole 'six Sirens' limit a thing of legend made real, or because people aren't looking hard enough?_

 _Doctor Lilith Cashlin: Yellow eyes. Noted powers: 'Phasewalk' (a form of teleportation through an adjacent dimension: can be applied to other people and even large objects with varying degrees of precision), pyrokinesis._

 _Maya (last name unknown): Blue hair, pale eyes. Noted powers: 'Phaselock' (envelops the target in a field of paralysing energy: can freeze time with enough power). Demonstrations of power by Maya suggest that her abilities may be corrosive-related(_ _1)_ _._ _What do I call that, caustokinesis? Oxykinesis? Oxy being Greek for 'acid' or 'sharpness' of course. No, no, not oxykinesis. People will think it has something to do with oxygen. Caustokinesis it is, until I can think of something better._

 _Angel (last name unknown, daughter of Handsome Jack): Has faintest red tinge to the centre of otherwise blue eyes, but seems to be normal, despite pale skin, Phase-Organ, and asymmetry. Noted powers: 'Phase-shift' (Manipulating electronics, technopathy), electrokinesis._

I pondered the last profile in front of me. It bothered me that I couldn't remember Angel's last name, or Jack's. To me, even when we first met, they were either 'Angel' or 'Uncle John'. Jack had always referred to himself as such, too, by first name.

The door to the bathroom opened, and I said, swivelling around, "Perfect timing, Angel. What is your…ah."

The reason for my response was fairly simple: Angel was naked. She wasn't hiding the fact, either. She was standing there, looking at me. I looked at her body. Despite Dr Zed's administration of a muscle regenerator while she was briefly in the medical tank, she still looked painfully thin, particularly around the arms. I saw all the tattoos of the Phase-Organ covering the left side of her body.

She was still one of the most beautiful things I had ever seen, and it took an especial effort to look away before things got more awkward than they already were. I felt my cheeks redden. "Angel…what's your last name?"

"Snyder."

I looked back at her in shock. She was pulling on her underwear. "Snyder?"

"Well…I'd rather have your name than keep mine," she said as she finished pulling her underwear on, and clambered into her bed.

"Yeah, but Jack never used his last name. I don't like not knowing."

Eventually, she said, "…Clarke(2)."

"…Clarke? Seriously?" I rubbed the back of my head. "That's not a bad name. Angel Clarke." I pencilled in 'Clarke' over a now-scribbled out 'last name unknown'.

"What're you doing?" she asked.

"Writing up some notes on Sirens," I said. "I'm supposed to be, theoretically, one of the top experts in the universe, which is to say that I know probably enough to fill a couple of short scientific papers than maybe half a page. And that's still pitiful. I've met three, dissected a fourth, and I still know so bloody little." I rubbed my forehead, turning to face her. "And with everything that's happened in the last couple of days, God knows I need some way of organising my thoughts."

Angel nodded. "I know how that feels. Dad…he never gave me a chance."

I raised an eyebrow. "You still call him Dad?"

"Well…he was my father. And there was a time when he did treat me well…" Angel sighed. "But…well, my real Dad is dead. He died when he put me into that damned Control Core cage. I only call Jack Dad out of habit."

Whatever we had to say was interrupted by an unwelcome interruption by an admittedly welcome voice. " _Richard? Angel?_ " Lilith said over ECHO.

"Over here, quickly!" Angel said. I hurried over to her, and her eye glowed again as she held a hand to my ECHO device. "Phase-shift activated," she intoned.

" _Angel? What did you just do?_ " Lilith asked after a brief burst of static.

"Tinkered with Sanctuary's ECHO systems. It should be less easy for Jack to track you, and to intercept our transmissions. It won't stop him, but his best hacker isn't working for him anymore. You're welcome," she concluded, with a faint sardonic lilt. But her smile vanished. "Is everyone all right up there?"

" _We're still trying to figure out what happened. How did you guys survive? Roland said you slid out just before I shifted Sanctuary._ "

"I think we got caught up in a backlash from your powers. You know, like what happened to the others when you shifted Sanctuary for the first time. Thankfully, it sent us here," I explained.

" _And where's that?_ "

"Oasis."

" _Huh. Near Captain Blade's old hunting grounds_ ," Lilith said. " _Well, that's a bit more outside Hyperion's reach than we are, so you should be fine for the time being. How are the others?_ "

"They're fine," Angel said. "We kicked sand pirate ass. Remind me to never piss Tina off: she's more accurate with grenades than I am with a rifle. I've seen the others fight, but…"

"Oh, and Lilith? You've got some competition from Angel in the 'showy Eridium-fuelled attack' department," I said. "Angel knows how to shoot lightning."

"… _Damn_ ," Lilith said, after a suitable pause. " _I'd have loved to seen a sand pirate get hit by a bolt of lightning. I guess I'll have to take a raincheck. Angel, you still have those Eridium nuggets I gave you?_ "

She nodded. "Thanks for those, by the way."

" _No problem. I had a feeling you might need them, to fuel your powers. As it is, it's just as well: we're still trying to reconnect our own Fast Travel station. Sorry, kids, but you're on your own._ "

"How about the others? Are they okay?" I asked.

" _Thankfully, you were the only guys unaccounted for. Roland, Brick, and Mordecai are fine. They'll be glad to know you're fine, especially Roland. He cares for you two especially, not to mention Tina. The other Vault Hunters are fine._ "

"What about Moxxi? Tannis? Hammerlock? Scooter? Zed?"

" _They're all fine, and I'm sure Moxxi will be glad to know Tim's fine. Scooter's currently trying to fix the damage: we managed to get the damaged engine stabilised so that we're not tilting anymore, but it was a near thing. He's also trying to figure out how to boost the power to the shields without taxing the engines. Zed's treating the wounded. Two people died this time. Thankfully, no others fell out like you did. But those two were too close to a moonshot. They got turned into giblets, we're not even sure who they were. Tannis is doing the DNA testing. Hopefully, we have records of them somewhere._ "

Angel nodded. "Look, Lilith, I'm sorry. If it weren't for me…"

" _Angel, if we had killed you like you wanted in Control Core Angel, Jack may very well have done the same thing. Hell, if Richard hadn't warned me about why I shouldn't go anywhere near there, Jack might've captured me. And then, we'd all be in the shit. Apologies won't bring back the dead, either in Sanctuary or New Haven. But in any case, we exist to piss Jack off. We got your message, Angel, about the Fast Travel station. We'll send someone down as soon as we can. I'll tell Roland he can contact Tina. He's very worried about her. She's like a daughter to him._ "

Angel nodded again. "I tinkered with all the others' ECHO devices when we got here."

" _Don't you have one?_ "

"Lilith, even outside Control Core Angel, I can connect to the ECHOnet with my mind. It would be easier near a device, but I can do it, so I don't need an ECHO device. I'd explored most of the ECHOnet long before Jack stuck me into Control Core Angel. That…was not a good experience, by the way."

"Control Core Angel?" I asked.

"Well, yes, but let's just say that seeing certain things on the ECHOnet before you turn eight is pretty bad," Angel admitted. "I learned pretty quickly to avoid those areas."

I remembered one time we met, back when we were kids, when Angel had this weird look on her face, a sort of distant look. She even asked me whether there was anything she could use to scrub out her brain. Now it made sense. She probably got traumatised by the experience.

" _Okay, well, I'm sorry, kids, but unfortunately, you guys are on your own for the moment. Try to stay out of trouble, alright? We'll send someone to help._ "

"As long as it isn't Claptrap, we're golden," I said. "Take care up there. Tell the others I said 'hi'."

" _Will do. Lilith out._ "

I sat there, on the edge of Angel's bed, in silence. It took me a moment to notice that the sheet had slipped down, revealing her bra. I tried not to stare. Damn, she looked good, despite being so scrawny.

Angel chuckled sadly. "I know it's going to be hot tonight. That's why I'm a bit undressed. Anyway, I'm used to strange people looking at me naked. At least you're a friend."

This got my attention. "But…how?"

"Jack couldn't run everything himself, as much as he wanted to. He had to give me medical checks twice a year, even before he got the bright idea of using me as an Eridium catalyst. Just to make sure there was nothing the automated medical systems didn't pick up. He hired a doctor each time, promised him vast amounts of money to keep quiet, and then had them check me over. He also had technicians take off my medical harnesses when I grew out of them, and put the new ones on. He murdered them all. He couldn't let my existence leak. He even had me murder my own mother, who protested about my treatment."

This was new to me. I remembered Aunt Gillian, John's wife(3). I remembered her disappearing, and John blaming her death on bandits, as he would come to do with anything that went wrong. "How…how…"

Her hands reached up to her neck. "Remember that collar? It was a control device. A slave collar, for want of a better term. You removed that from me. If I had tried, it would have stimulated the pain receptors throughout my body. It also controlled my mind, to a certain degree. That's how I was made to take down Sanctuary's shields. He first used it on me to murder Mom. He had me take control of a Loader and kill her." Angel squeezed her eyes shut, and let out a sob. I quickly gathered her into a hug. Warm tears wet my shirt.

"But you fought back, didn't you?"

She nodded. "I told you before, I've been engaged in a war of attrition of sorts with Jack's control. I'd manage to find some way to circumvent it, and he'd find a countermeasure. It was part of the Eridium amplification system, too. It made me feel… _sick_. Like he was… _molesting_ me. Though in a way, he did. He raped my life, just like he rapes everyone else's lives. Uses them and discards them as he pleases. He loves having power and control over people. He loves feeling like a god." Angel emitted a sound of disgust.

So did I. Every time I heard something new about Angel and her life, it only made me want to add to the things I wanted to do to Jack before he died. He had taken the life of a little girl, his own daughter to boot, and made it a living hell, so much so that death would be a release. He claimed to love her, and yet, everything that I saw suggested that, at best, what he felt was possessiveness, a covetous state that passed itself off as love.

I couldn't help it. I put my face in one of my hands, and began to weep. I had gone through enough in my life, true, especially over the past little while. But that was pitiful, compared to what Angel went through.

Eventually, I said, wiping a tear away, "He wouldn't know what that's like. He had to use a goddess to help with that."

She gave a wry, if sad, smile. "Oh, you flatterer."

"Well, you're practically a deity when it comes to electronics. Plus, you can bring down the lightning. Zeus, eat your heart out. And, well, look at you. You're a bit too thin, thanks to Jack, but, well, who wouldn't want you? You're a sexy Siren goddess. Hell, Lilith was worshipped, apparently."

"By a bunch of Psychos," Angel said, raising an eyebrow.

"Yeah, but, well…my point is, Angel, I know that you're beautiful, inside and out. Makes me wonder what you see in me, really."

She gently raised a hand to my cheek and caressed it. "I see someone who looks past the Siren, and just sees me. You believed in me enough to not only save my life, but to set me free. I didn't even think that was possible. Even before then, I saw a haunted, intelligent, compassionate guy grow up from the scared little boy I knew. I missed everything we could have done. Dating, kissing…" A blush came over her features now. "You know, stuff like that. Obsessed with Sirens, and you had that Sci-Zone thing going, but…I knew about that since we were kids, remember?"

I nodded. "I just feel…like I don't deserve you. Now that the excitement of getting you out of there alive and well is gone…"

"I know. And I know what will help." And with that, she leaned forward, and began to kiss me. I froze in shock, before beginning to return her kiss. Our very first kiss.

All too soon, it had to be over, as I needed to get ready for bed myself. We were still going to sleep in separate beds, but I knew a step had been taken forward. Wouldn't Jack be pissed if he knew I had kissed his daughter?

 **CHAPTER 2 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **Sorry if this chapter seems a little awkward. This was partly about Snyder actually showing off his expertise, such as it is, on Sirens, partly about Sanctuary and the others getting back in contact, and partly about Snyder and Angel growing closer, albeit somewhat awkwardly.**

 **Now, I didn't annotate the jargon I used in Snyder's little report, but a lot of them are real terms, or derived from real terms. I mentioned organelles, which was a term I used in** ** _Hooked on a Feeling_** **. '-cyte' is a standard suffix used for any kind of cell (an erythrocyte, for example, is a red blood cell, and a melanocyte is a cell containing melanin). Neoplastic does mean cancerous (a neoplasia is another term for a cancer), and cancer cells do contain lengthy telomeres, which are at the ends of chromosomes. I made up that crap about the tattoo being the surface part of an organ/mass of tissue that gives Sirens their powers, but I thought it plausible.** **And yes, 'oxy' means 'acid' or 'sharp'. Oxygen literally means 'acid maker'.**

 **Why does Angel walk out naked? A number of reasons. One, it's hot in Oasis (no air-con in the room, either), and unlike Sanctuary, she wouldn't be comfortable either in pyjamas (which were left behind at Sanctuary) or her clothes. Two, as she mentioned, she became desensitized to being naked around others thanks to what happened in Control Core Angel, poor girl. Three, and this isn't mentioned in the story, she was feeling playful, and wanted to troll Snyder a little, and see how he reacted.**

 **Why did I write in that bit about Angel being made to kill her mother? Well, at one point in the game, Jack claims that Angel killed her mother, and implies that this was why she was put into the Control Core. But an ECHO Log in Get to Know Jack claims that Angel's mother had protested against her treatment in the 'chair' (presumably Control Core). I therefore decided that Jack, as a test of his control collar, used Angel to assassinate his wife. He's a sick bastard.**

 **By the way, next chapter, there will be Tim Lawrence getting his chance to shine, with some help from Angel.**

 **1\. I think, maybe, the Sirens have elemental properties to their powers: Lilith, canonically, is fire, Maya is possibly corrosive (the Blight Phoenix skill attacks enemies with fire and corrosive damage), and Angel, as I have extrapolated, is electricity. Which means that the other Sirens may have powers over slag, ice (an element in the Pre-Sequel), and explosion properties.**

 **2\. It's pretty obvious why I gave her and Jack that last name, but I'll spell it out anyway: Clarke is the last name of Handsome Jack's voice actor, Dameon Clarke. I have to say, he makes an excellent villain: my first exposure to him was his performance as Cell in** ** _Dragonball Z_** **. Handsome Jack, however, surpasses Cell.**

 **3\. I chose the name 'Gillian' as the first name of Angel's mother because it's not far removed from 'Jill'. Gillian is actually the long version of 'Jill'. Why? Well, the nursery rhyme, of course. Jack and Jill.**


	4. Chapter 3: Timothy Lawrence's Awesome

**CHAPTER 3:**

 **TIMOTHY LAWRENCE'S AWESOME PLAN**

The next morning, after dressing and breakfast, we convened in the town square of Oasis, Shade being content to watch us from a distance at Kitty Kream. Tina was elated that Roland and the others had survived (he had called her last night over ECHO), but Tim had wanted to discuss something.

"I've been thinking," Tim said, toying with the mask of Handsome Jack's face. "We need to get Hyperion off our backs before we can do anything else, right?"

"Right. Why, have you got an idea?"

"Hell, yeah. Look, to be an effective body double, you have to think like the guy you're imitating, right? So, I thought, what would Jack do in my position? Stranded out in the middle of nowhere, enemies all around…and, from my perspective, someone else in the top job." He gave a grin. "And it just occurred to me: it's relatively common knowledge he has body doubles running around, especially after the Elpis fiasco. He'd think we don't have the spine to stand up to him, right?"

Angel's eyes widened. "You're going to impersonate him, try to set the rest of Hyperion on him?"

Tim smirked. "I doubt I'd be able to get everyone in Hyperion to listen to me, Angel, but if I said the right words, I'd sow the seeds of doubt and discord. Some in Hyperion might not know whether to trust me or the real Jack. And that sort of mess might give Roland and the others, not to mention us, some major breathing room. In fact, that's why I wanted to talk to you, Angel. Now, you can do some fancy stuff with your powers, but can you make it seem like I'm doing an ECHO broadcast from one of Jack's offices?"

Angel frowned. "A bit tricky, but yes."

"Can you find out where he is right now?"

"That's much easier. I know his personal ECHO comms number. Give me a second…oh. Looks like he's out of the office. And with someone you know, Tim."

I frowned when I considered this. "Wait a moment, is he in Lynchwood?" I asked.

Tim's eyes widened. "Nisha?!"

Gaige frowned. "Who's Nisha?"

"Nisha Kadam(1)," Angel explained. "Former bounty hunter, or as she liked to put it, a bandit who killed other bandits."

"My former comrade in finding the Vault on Elpis," Tim explained. "Along with Wilhelm, a Claptrap robot, Lady Aurelia Hammerlock, and Athena."

"I remember some of them," I muttered. "Wilhelm, you've met, of course. I never met Lady Hammerlock, and from what I have heard, that's a good thing. Athena I did meet, though. She was a former Crimson Lance assassin, now a mercenary. Probably one of the better people there, along with you, Tim."

"So, what's this Nisha like?" Gaige asked.

"Mad, bad, and dangerous to know," Tim said.

"To be fair, you just described half of Pandora's population, Tim," I pointed out.

"Yeah, but above the norm even for Pandora. Seriously, I swear she got off on the violence. And there were times when she put the moves on me!" Tim shuddered.

"I've met her some times since too," I said, shuddering as well. "Like, don't get me wrong, she's a looker and smart, but she's a fucking psychopath who gets off on hanging people. I heard she made every crime in Lynchwood a capital offence."

"So, she's Jack's lover, right?" Gaige asked. "What does Lynchwood have to do with it?"

"Lynchwood is one of the main Eridium mining towns on Pandora," I explained. "Jack set her up as a sheriff there after the Elpis fiasco. She's basically his lackey there, and proud of it."

"Oh my," Angel said, blushing.

"What?"

"Umm…Gaige, could you cover Tina's ears?"

"Why?" Tina asked, as Gaige covered them. "Are they having sex?"

"…Yes," Angel said rather lamely, having decided that lying to the disturbingly-seasoned girl was pointless. She tapped her temple. "I can listen to the feed from his ECHO device directly. Let's just say that Dad's coping with his frustrations with some exercise with Nisha."

"Cool! Can we listen in?" Tina asked.

"No!" everyone else, save for Krieg (who had uncharacteristically remained silent for the moment), chorused. I could have sworn I heard a 'Yes!' coming from the direction of Shade's position, though.

"Anyway, that's good," Tim said. "What we do is, I do a transmission which Angel makes as if it's coming from one of Jack's offices, one that is preferably isolated, and other people won't be able to check easily. You know any, Angel?"

"Quite a few, Tim." I saw a rather impish, malicious little grin on her face, one that I was sure that was matched on everyone else's faces, including my own.

"Good. I'll have to do it indoors, so it sounds right. Do you have to be in the same room? Only, I think you might laugh when you hear me say what I'm gonna say."

"No, I can do it from outside the room. You seem ready."

"Angel, Jack's fucked me over plenty over the last little while," Tim said. "He's fucked us all over. I think he's overdue some payback."

* * *

" _Heeeyyy, guys, Handsome Jack here_ ," came the voice of Tim, or rather, Jack. I forgot what Tim used to sound like before he got his operations to look like Jack. Angel sat with me in our room, with Gaige, Tina, Krieg, and even Shade for company. It seemed that Shade delighted in the chance to see us kicking Jack in the metaphorical testicles. Didn't make him any less creepier.

Angel's eyes were glowing gently as she re-routed the ECHO broadcast. It would show up as originating in Jack's office (one that he had near Control Core Angel, in fact, so it meant it was secret, relatively, and isolated), but was blanket-broadcasting not only to Hyperion, but to most ECHO devices on Pandora and Elpis. I knew Roland and the others were listening, and hopefully getting a kick out of it. Every now and then, Angel would look carefully at her Eridium injector's meter, but thankfully, if the Eridium levels were being depleted faster, it was only imperceptibly so.

The tank-top and dark jeans she wore now reminded me of the medical harness she used to wear. The clothing was pretty flattering for her, and made her look badass, and not just like a neglected waif. If she ever showed off her wings again, she'd look amazing.

" _Anyway, it's come to my attention that one of my douchebag doubles has been taking control of MY company_ ," Tim said. I knew he was nervous as hell, but it thankfully didn't show in his voice. " _I delegated some work to this treacherous son of a bitch, and he decided to do some pretty stupid things. Even now, he's screwing my squeeze, but he also tried to destroy some of my most valuable assets. Those bastard Vault Hunters stole some very valuable assets of mine, and while I was sleeping off a hangover from commiserating about it, the stupid prick tried to blow them to Kingdom Come. Well, I needed those assets alive and intact, and this stupid asshat thinks he knows what I'm thinking! Any orders regarding the Vault Key, Angel, and Dr Snyder, along with the Vault Hunters and Sanctuary, are hereby rescinded with extreme prejudice, at least until I can get this fucker who thinks he can usurp me. Once this traitor is dealt with, then we can concentrate on dealing with the other problems. Handsome Jack out!_ " With that, he ceased his transmission.

Angel began to laugh. "Oh, wait, you guys have gotta hear this. Phase-shift activated." Her eyes flared blue again briefly, and my ECHO began emitting the sounds of what could sound like love-making, given all the grunting, but turned out to be something very different.

" _You little shit_ ," Nisha's voice snarled. " _I'm going to_ …"

" _The mask!_ " Jack gasped out, clearly being strangled. " _Take it off!_ "

" _I don't see what…_ " Nisha gasped as something was undone. " _Oh._ "

Jack began coughing, presumably as Nisha stopped trying to throttle him. Eventually, he snarled, " _Remember how I got this? You were there! That bitch Lilith punched that thing I got in the Elpis Vault, and effectively branded my face! I may have put masks on my doubles, but few people alive know about this scar! I don't put the scars on my doubles!_ "

"… _Okay. I believe you. But will anyone else at Hyperion do so?_ "

" _Probably. Those asshats are gullible as hell. Those bastards in Sanctuary are behind this. And it's a good ploy, I'll give them that. I know that a good chunk of Hyperion will be after me. Gah! I want to shoot someone!_ "

" _Well, let's get dressed and get our guns. There's a surplus of bandits here, and I know that'll help you feel better. Then we can pick up where we left off…_ "

"Crap," I muttered as Angel cut the connection. I knew there was a scar or some sort of disfigurement on Jack's face, otherwise, why the mask? But what? "Angel, do you know what that scar looks like?"

"A big version of the Vault logo," Angel replied. An image showed up on my ECHO, courtesy of a file Angel must have pulled from somewhere. Jack, maskless, with an inverted 'V' burned into his face, with one of the lines of the inverted 'V' over his left eye. Said eye looked dead and pale.

"Jesus," I muttered.

"I think I'm gonna be sick," Gaige murmured.

"Jack destroyed the images, but I kept a couple," Angel said quietly. "To remind myself what he really is like beneath the mask."

I frowned at the image. Now I understood something of the real rancour Jack had for the Vault Hunters, especially Lilith. I knew he gotten even worse in his attitude since that fiasco on Elpis, the one that had him wearing that mask. I activated an ECHO connection to Lilith. "You heard all that?"

" _I heard the broadcast you got Tim to make. That was pretty awesome_ ," she said.

"Yeah, well, Jack nearly got offed by Nisha. But he managed to persuade her otherwise by showing her his scar. The one you gave him?"

"… _Damn_ ," Lilith muttered. " _And she was there, she saw it happen. Wilhelm, Tim, Claptrap, Lady Hammerlock, Athena…they saw it happen with her._ "

"Wait, Claptrap? As in, the one in Sanctuary now?" I asked.

" _That's the one, apparently. But it seems that Nisha didn't get fooled. Shit. Then again, that would have been too much to hope for._ "

"Well, we've hurt him," Angel said. "And he knows it. It's got to hurt."

"STRIP THE FLESH!" Krieg bellowed, having remained silent for some time. "SALT THE WOUND!"

Something in Krieg's words inspired me. I had an idea. Not as awesome as Tim's, but certainly a good one. "Yeah," I said. "Let's salt that wound." I pulled out my trusty music player. A little battered, but still going strong. I flicked through the tracks, before I found the perfect one. I almost never played it, except when I wanted to piss people off by playing it loudly. "Let's dump a _barrel_ of salt on that wound. Tell me, Angel, can you send this to Jack and Nisha's ECHO devices without them knowing where it came from? And have it play perpetually, loudly, and make it hard, if not impossible, to stop it? And put a caption on the ECHO display?"

Angel looked at the track that I had highlighted, and grimaced, albeit in a gently mocking way. "Oh, Ricky, is that really necessary? That might be too cruel." She was only being playful in her horror, though. Compared to what she went through, what I proposed was an infinitesimal cruelty.

"What is that?" Tina asked, peering at the music player.

"Well…did I ever tell you guys about who my parents named me for? I was originally told it was for Richard Dawkins. And then, my mother admitted it was actually because she liked this guy." I grimaced. "That was _not_ a fun day."

"I've got a good image to go with it, Ricky," Angel said. It was an image, presumably from Hyperion surveillance cameras, of me pointing dramatically at the camera, my eyes wide with madness. It's weird, looking at me. I was a gangling scarecrow of a figure in a labcoat. I still had that neatly trimmed beard, which I had shaved before I joined the Vault Hunters, and which I now decided to keep off. My red hair made me look even more manic.

I remembered that day. I had gone into the Sci-Zone without warning, and by the end of it, I had developed a new kind of radiation burn cream. It was one of the better attacks, given that nobody actually got hurt, and Wilhelm didn't have to sedate me. Well, I stubbed a toe, but that was it.

But it was perfect. I dictated the caption, which Angel arranged very well, hacking the software. And then, she sent it off. "So…" Tina asked, frowning. "What does it mean when you said, 'You Got Rick-Rolled'?"

Lilith chimed in. " _Let's just say that Rick is an evil man, and I love the way he thinks._ "

I laughed, joined by the others present. What I just did was puerile, stupid, and liable to piss Jack and Nisha off more than we should. But really, what better way to salt the wound than to have Jack and Nisha's ECHO devices play, loudly and obnoxiously, Richard 'Rick' Astley's _Never Gonna Give You Up?_

 **CHAPTER 3 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **I decided, having brought Tim into the Oasis party, to have him do something really good. I thought, if he sounds like Handsome Jack, what's to stop the others from using him to sow discord in Hyperion? I wanted him to have the idea, hence the chapter title. Of course, I couldn't make it too easy to get rid of Handsome Jack, and it wouldn't be anyway. I was really drawn to do something good for the character after reading** ** _The Man Who Would Be Jack_** **by LittlePorcelainDoll and Orieon.**

 **Now, if you're concerned about Tina's reaction regarding Jack and Nisha having sex, keep in mind that this is a girl who calls one of her stuffed toys 'Felicia Sexopants', calls missiles 'badonkadonks' (which is a term for well-shaped buttocks, apparently: I prefer to say that someone is callipygian, myself), calls the main character a 'ho' and a 'pimp', and generally has a vocabulary you'd expect from someone at least twice her age, and not a very flattering vocabulary either. Plus, she's probably teasing the others too.**

 **As for Snyder's choice of song to annoy Jack and Nisha at the end, I actually had to think hard about this. I considered** ** _We Will Rock You_** **and** ** _We are the Champions_** **by Queen,** ** _Poppa Don't Preach_** **by Madonna,** ** _Everything You Know Is Wrong_** **by Weird Al Yankovic,** ** _Live and Let Die_** **by Wings, and** ** _The Song That Never Ends_** **. But when I thought about** ** _Never Gonna Give You Up_** **, well, it appealed to me on so many levels. One, Snyder shares a first name with Rick Astley (Rick being short for Richard). Two, having Jack being Rick-Rolled is sure to appeal to many, especially considering that Jack seems like the sort of person who'd rather give a Rick-Roll than receive one. He can dish it out, but he can't take it back.**

 **A bit of a warning: after this chapter, it might be a while before the next one. I've got a lot of fanfics floating around, and in addition, I've got some good ideas for a novel I am trying to write. So I hope that this chapter, with what I hope is some really awesome and funny moments, will keep you guys happy.**

 **Thanks to MrGreen37 and Darkstar248 for your kind reviews so far. I hope you enjoyed this chapter as much as I did writing it.**

 **1\. Kadam is Nisha's last name, according to at least one of her voice lines in the Pre-Sequel.**


	5. Chapter 4: Captain Scarlett and Her

**CHAPTER 4:**

 **CAPTAIN SCARLETT AND HER PIRATE'S BOOTY**

We decided, after the initial elation of pulling one over Jack, that we'd leave to meet Captain Scarlett. As much as I was reluctant to get into any quest for the supposed treasure of Captain Blade, or meet any potentially treacherous pirate, Oasis did feel a touch too exposed. And Shade's manner gave me the creeps. He did offer us the use of his sandskiff, but it promptly exploded. Not badly, but a number of parts needed to be replaced, and he directed us to them. I wondered whether he had sabotaged it, which made me wonder why he then directed us to replacement parts. Then again, his sanity was questionable.

Krieg and Gaige volunteered to track down the most dangerous part, one that had been eaten by a sandworm. Well, Krieg took off after the sandworm with glee, waving his buzzaxe, and Gaige followed him. The rest of us split up to get the parts off the various (and dead) townsfolk, who were 'voiced', such as they were, by Shade. It'd be sad if it weren't so bloody creepy.

Krieg and Gaige returned, covered in sandworm bile, Gaige looking annoyed, and Krieg holding the engine part aloft in one hand triumphantly. "I HAVE CONQUERED SHAI-HALUD!(1)"

Gaige shot the elated Psycho a glare, and then looked at us. "Don't ask," she muttered.

"Don't have to," Tim said. "That mess sorta speaks for itself, doesn't it?"

Gaige, scowling, fitted the various parts to the sandskiff. As the sandskiff was made ready, digitised into the Catch-a-Ride system, we suddenly heard Shade yell, "Greetings, friends!"

"Heyooo!"

I blinked. That was a very familiar cry. And as we turned to face the newcomers, we stopped and stared in amazement. The first was very conspicuous in this place, dressed in what can only be described as a sexy Mad Hatter outfit in purple. Her buxom body and stylized make-up was famous throughout Pandora, along with her arena, the Underdome, destroyed by Jack. It was none other than Mad Moxxi.

 **MAD MOXXI AS**

 **THE SEDUCTRESS**

 **Buxom, Beautiful, and Bloodthirsty**

"What ho, there, old chap?" greeted an older man, wearing what could have been, in another time, a standard hunter's outfit, all khaki and pith. He had glasses, greying moustache, and, most distinctively, a cybernetic arm and leg. Sir Alastair Hammerlock, the famous zoologist.

 **SIR HAMMERLOCK AS**

 **THE GAME HUNTER**

 **Half-Flesh, Half-Machine, All Gentleman**

And then, there was one who looked a lot like a bandit, masked and armed to the teeth. But he was friendly, even if his vocabulary consisted of one word, spoken a thousand different ways. Steve the Bandit.

 **STEVE AS**

 **HIMSELF**

 **Heyooo!**

"Hey, guys, what are you doing here?" I asked.

"Roland sent us here, sugar," Moxxi purred. She took her distinctive top hat off, and ran a hand through her brown hair. "The others are, well, busy. We'll discuss it in a moment."

* * *

We summoned a few sandskiffs with surprisingly little trouble. It was decided to have three to a skiff. Gaige, Krieg, and Tina would stick to one. Tim, Moxxi, and Steve to a second. Angel, Hammerlock, and myself would pilot the third one.

Scarlett had very kindly provided ECHO coordinates, and so we followed them. As we did so, Angel turned to Hammerlock, who was driving the sandskiff, and asked, "Why are you guys here? Where are the others?"

"Roland and Lilith decided that we needed to take measures while Jack is trying to deal with Mr Lawrence's deception. Brick has gone back to Thousand Cuts, while Mordecai has teamed up with the other Vault Hunters. Lilith has gone back to Frostburn Canyon to reassume her _nom de guerre_ of the Firehawk. Roland is coordinating the other Vault Hunters to find out more about the Vault Jack is trying to breach, as Jack has information in the Hyperion Info Stockade. But they decided to send us to you. In fact, Roland is most concerned that you, Angel, are kept out of Hyperion's clutches. Lilith can most assuredly look after herself, but you, well, you are only freshly out of Control Core Angel."

"I'm not a fragile waif," Angel retorted quietly. "But thanks all the same."

"You should have seen her yesterday, Sir Hammerlock," I said. "She was able to use lightning on the sand pirates. Took a lot out of her, though."

"By Jove, most intriguing! And you do look less peaky than you did before. Being away from Jack is clearly most salutary to your health." Hammerlock smiled at me. "And Lilith told me of you inflicting a Rick-Roll on Jack. Rather lowbrow, but still a fine and droll jest indeed! Well done!"

"So, any reason you came here, Sir Hammerlock?"

"Well, besides the safety of yourselves, there's some interesting wildlife in the area, with the sandworms and the stalkers. It has been so long since I have done any field research, old chap. And there's still life in this old war horse yet! What's more, the legend of Captain Blade does hold a certain fascination with me. Moxxi, I believe, is considerably more mercenary in her interests, though I do not hold it against her. She is concerned about you all, which is why she is here, but she also believes that perhaps some of the treasure might fund the restoration of her Underdome. That is what spurred her to leave her establishment in the care of one of her trusted employees."

"What about Steve?" Angel asked.

"Well, from what I know of the man, I think he just gets bored easily, and thought hunting treasure preferable to getting inebriated. Unfortunately, it is deuced difficult to decipher the declarations of a man who just says 'Heyo!' all the time. I daresay he is more entertaining than Claptrap, though. And a better shot."

"Claptrap isn't that bad," Angel said. "Once you get past the egotism and the loud voice."

"Angel, your father's good works are few and far between," I said. "Destroying Claptrap's product line was one of them."

"Can you name another good work of Dad's?" she asked wryly.

"…I'll get back to you on that."

* * *

By the time we reached Wurmwater, and began to get close to Captain Scarlett's location, I couldn't think of any good works Jack had done offhand. At least none that he didn't do to boost up his image. Ironically, while his wiping out the Claptrap units was borne out of selfish motivations, it was probably his finest hour.

I thought about some of those who worked under him. Wilhelm came readily to mind, the brutal cyborg mercenary becoming Jack's most lethal enforcer. He got decapitated by Zer0 while trying to kill me. Nisha was another. I remembered one of my few friends, Dave. What was his last name again? Dave Jones. He died, whimpering in pain, Jack torturing him with corrosive rounds in order to get back at me. I remembered his last words, asking me why I had pissed Jack off.

I remembered Dr Samuels, my mentor, and the ECHO logs that detailed her being forced to perform Eridium and slag experiments on living human subjects. When others had asked me about whether I had done such experiments to living humans, I had lied, save to Lilith. Deep in the Sci-Zone, I did do that to a few security guards. They were frankly pricks, but that still haunted me. It was in the aftermath of my parents' deaths when I did that.

I frowned when another face came to mind. Of an older man whom I had known. Jack moved him to another laboratory because I very nearly vivisected him while I was in the Sci-Zone. What was his name again? Annoying, shrill, Handsome Jack fanboy? Old enough to probably be my father, and thus too old to be any kind of fanboy?

Ah, now I remember. "Hey, Angel, what happened to old Nakayama?"

"Still being a fanboy, from what I know. Dad avoids him like the plague," Angel said. "Only keeps him around because he knows that if he asks Nakayama to do anything, Nakayama would fall over himself to do it. Even down some stairs(2)."

"Yeesh. Wonder what he made of this morning's broadcast?"

"I don't know," Angel said. We were finally approaching Scarlett's ship, a magnificent thing that looked like the modern, sandskiff equivalent of one of those old galleons, or whatever they called them. It was nestled in a canyon.

Over ECHO, Scarlett appeared. " _Oh, is that you? The Vault Hunters from Oasis? Well_ …"

Suddenly, a swarm of sandskiffs appeared, and began attacking. Over ECHO, we heard one man snarl, " _Sandman wants your piece of the Compass, bitch! Hand it over!_ "

" _Aaand I'm being attacked. Marvellous_ ," Scarlett said with mild exasperation. " _Could you give me a hand with Sandman's boys? I'd do so myself, but some traitor has disabled my ship's weapon systems(_ _3)_ _._ "

"Ricky, cover me!" Angel said, squatting down as low as she could.

I went to the gun turret, and began spraying rounds at the sand pirates' skiffs, mostly to keep them distracted. "What are you doing?" I asked.

Her only answer was "Phase-shift activated." Suddenly, one of the sand-skiffs seemed to lose control, veering sharply into another one. The collision caused the two sand-skiffs to explode. The third sand-skiff was destroyed by Gaige sending Deathtrap over.

" _Huh, killed them all_ ," Captain Scarlett remarked. " _Nice. Get up here, and we can talk business._ "

* * *

The ship lowered a ladder and a platform, and the nine of us boarded. Somewhat warily, given both sand pirates' general reputation, and Scarlett's own admission that we could kill each other, find the treasure, or both. But the sand pirates, while they watched us warily as well, nonetheless did nothing to suggest that they were going to harm us. Mad Moxxi seemed most confident amongst them, and I had to wonder why.

We were told to head to the upper deck, which we did. The last of us clambered up just in time to see a body fall from the crow's nest, hitting the ground with a thud. Sliding down the ladder after it was the most extraordinary figure, in more ways than one.

Slender and elegant, with tanned skin and surprisingly well-styled (given the isolation here) red hair, the woman was dressed in an outfit that evoked the image of a pirate captain, albeit updated for the modern age. Instead of an eyepatch, she had a cybernetic eye (and not a vision-enhancing monocle strapped over her eye, as I had thought). She had a hook in place of her left hand, but I knew that it was quite a sophisticated bit of cybernetics, and could probably have a number of attachments. Her right leg was cybernetic, but moved as effortlessly as a normal leg. I reckoned Hammerlock was jealous of her cybernetics, though she wasn't actually his type. She had a few piercings, including a ring through her lip, and some big loop earrings. She even had piercings in her _hat_ , four earrings decorating it.

"Nice moves out there. Not that I expected anything less from you, Moxxi, but the others? Well, you've got some celebrities in your midst. Sir Hammerlock, Handsome Jack…" She was walking casually, following the man who had fallen from the crow's nest, who was crawling away, gasping in pain.

"I'm not Jack, Ma'am," Tim said. "Just one of his former body doubles."

"Oh well, didn't think he'd grace us with his presence. Just as well. Not fond of the tosser. Oh, but where are my manners? Sorry, haven't even introduced myself. Do that a lot. I'm, um, Captain Scarlett." She gave an elegant little bow.

 **CAPTAIN SCARLETT**

 **The Beautiful, Backstabbing Buccaneer**

She then turned and shot the man she had thrown from the crow's nest with her massive revolver. "Nice to meet ya. Sorry to do that in front of you, but this dog works for Sandman, and disabled my defences. Anyway, I already know Moxxi," Scarlett said. "And I know of Sir Hammerlock. May I know your names?"

"I'll do the honours, Scarlett," Moxxi said. "This handsome guy is Timothy Lawrence. You may have heard his ECHO broadcast?"

"I did. That was you? Good performance!"

"I WANTED MORE HAM!" Krieg bellowed.

"Um, yes," Moxxi said. "This enthusiastic gentleman is known as Krieg."

"A Psycho, allied with Vault Hunters? Well, I thought that was odd," Scarlett remarked.

"This is Gaige, roboticist extraordinaire."

Gaige was bouncing up and down with excitement, clearly enjoying meeting a real pirate. "Oh, you are SO cool!"

"Thank you," Scarlett said with a smile.

"This is Tiny Tina, explosives expert," Moxxi continued.

"Well, what can I say? I have a prodigy on my ship," Scarlett said. "What sort of explosives do you like, Tina?"

"Ummm…big ones?"

"Moving along," Moxxi said, "This is Steve."

"Heyooo!"

"Charmed, I'm sure," Scarlett said, her smile a little fixed at this point.

"Heyo," Steve replied.

"And here, we have Dr Richard Snyder, former Hyperion scientist and an expert on Sirens," Moxxi said.

"Hey," I said. "Oh, and sometime mad scientist, don't forget that."

"Ah, I think I know that. Do you go into the Sci-Zone?" Scarlett asked.

"Uh, yes, but…"

"How did I know?" Scarlett asked. "Well, I met another person with your very condition. Had to feed him to the sandworms, though. Vivisected one of my crew."

"And this," Moxxi said, "is Angel."

"Hey," she said.

"You do look a lot like that Guardian Angel chick," Scarlett said.

"I was the model for her avatar," Angel said.

The pirate captain peered at Angel's markings. "And a Siren, too. Well, that's interesting."

"She's not a real Siren. She got a tattoo," I said. "She wanted to look like one."

"Ah, say no more," Scarlett said, though I wasn't sure if she bought it. "Well, now that we've introduced ourselves, shall I tell you about the legend of the treasure? Oh, sorry, what do you want, Tina?"

Tina had her hand in the air like an overenthusiastic schoolkid. "Cap, Cap, Cap Cap Cap! I think Doc and Angel want you for something."

"We do?" I asked, dumbfounded.

"We do?" Angel repeated, bemused.

"They do?" Scarlett finished, confused.

"Yeah, yeah, they do! I mean, I know they're in luuuurrrrve, and want each other badly and stuff, and I just thought, you bein' a ship's captain and all…" Tina looked at Scarlett with her wide, bulging eyes, doing a fair impression of a lost puppy. "Will you marry them?"

As Scarlett, Angel, and myself stared at the half-crazed thirteen-year old, Moxxi said, gently, "Sweetie, that thing about ship's captains being able to officiate over a wedding? That's a myth."

Tina's face was that of a child being told that Santa Claus didn't exist. I wondered if she still believed in Santa Claus, in fact. But as Tina's eyes welled up with tears, Scarlett said, "Well, technically, that's true, but they wouldn't have a problem with that, actually."

Angel and I whirled to face Scarlett. "What do you mean?" Angel demanded.

Scarlett gave a smile. "When I first moved to Oasis, occasionally, we'd get eloping lovers coming here. Sometimes, they'd come to me, you know, to experience that whole 'meeting sand pirates' thing. They wanted me to do the honours. I looked at the law, thought it'd make a bit of income, and thought, 'why not'? I am a qualified marriage officiant, or celebrant, or whatever have you."

I looked at Angel, who seemed slightly nonplussed. "Do you…want to?" I asked, tentatively. "I mean…it's a bit rushed, but…"

Angel, after some thought, shrugged. "I've been dreaming about this day for a long time. And it'll piss off my father."

Scarlett's eyes widened. "Oh, so you two _are_ eloping! That's great! Listen, if you do me a favour, a _big_ favour, I'll waive the fees for the wedding. I'd do it myself, but I've got to get my ship checked over before I'm attacked again. You see, you know something of Captain Blade, right? Legend states that he buried his treasure in a secret location to avoid his enemies getting a hold of it. He used a special mystical compass to mark its location. Now, I have one piece, because I'm awesome, but others have pieces. You just fought Sandman's ruffians, and he has one piece. I heard a rumour that the local Hyperion authorities have another. And I know for sure that a former…" She shuddered. "…A former crewmember of mine has the last piece. So, if you guys help me get the compass, I will wed these two lovely young people, and then, we will go on to get the treasure!"

I shot Angel a look. Well, _crap_. What have we gotten ourselves into this time?

 **CHAPTER 4 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **Okay, I said last chapter might be the last one for a while, but this one wrote itself so effortlessly, I knew I had to post it. But this one might be the last chapter for a while. Hope the little twist at the end gave you cause to be excited. :P** ** _You've Got to Hide Your Love Away_** **will return with Chapter 5:** ** _Herbert the Pervert_** **!**

 **Now, as you'll have noticed, three more characters have joined the hunt for Captain Blade's treasure, and given that they're effectively playable characters, I gave them titles. I originally intended just sending Steve, but bringing Moxxi and Hammerlock to the fore was too much of a temptation to resist. I decided to use the reason I gave in-story, of the other Vault Hunters looking for information on the new Vault and the Warrior. It gives other characters a chance to shine.**

 **I'll briefly discuss their Action Skills here. Moxxi's is** **Hello, Boys** **. The accuracy of all enemies is reduced significantly (as if they are allured by her, and don't want to shoot her), and some of her enemies even shoot at their allies. Well, what else would it be but using her sexiness?**

 **Hammerlock's is** **Skags of War** **. I thought, Hammerlock is like a big game hunter, and while he tends to be less of the stereotypical hunter, being more of a zoologist, I decided that, like Tim, he uses hologram constructs to attack, only these are of Skags that he uses like hunting dogs (he wouldn't use real Skags, as they are barely able to be domesticated). One of his attack quotes is 'Cry havoc! Let slip the Skags of War!' You can imagine him saying that, can't you?**

 **Steve's is, of course,** **Heyooo!** **. It brings enemy aggro onto him, but he's temporarily invulnerable, or at least highly resistant to damage, and can do more damage.**

 **Incidentally, because I noted these three as having 'character classes', I went back and wrote in the character classes of the others in the first chapter.**

 **Moxxi and Scarlett being friends and former lovers was apparently hinted at in dialogue in the game, according to the Borderlands Wiki, so I wrote it in. There'll also be a surprise regarding Scarlett later.**

 **Moxxi telling Tina that ship's captains being unable to officiate over a marriage is true. There are some cases where it's possible, but overall, officiating over a wedding is not one of the duties of a ship's captain. That being said, this bit was something I always had in mind, with Snyder and Angel getting married in this. I thought it'd be in Oasis, rather like Las Vegas with its quick weddings, but I decided to use Scarlett, and wrote in the explanation. Can you imagine Shade officiating a wedding? No. Just** ** _no_** **.**

 **Review-answering time.** **MrGreen37** **once more writes some very flattering comments about my characterisation, for which I thank him for. However, I have to break your bubble, MrGreen37:** ** _You've Got to Hide You Love Away_** **will only be covering the events of** ** _Captain Scarlett and her Pirate's Booty_** **. If I complete it, I will be doing one more story, based on** ** _Mr Torgue's Campaign of Carnage_** **. I am yet to play any of the other DLC missions, partly because I haven't finished the main game yet (and they're set after the main game finishes). That being said, thanks to you, Nakayama WILL be making an appearance in this story. Snyder and Angel's discussion of Nakayama is a bit of foreshadowing. You'll be pleased to note that Steve has joined the search for Blade's treasure.**

 **Darkstar248 : Oh, sorry. It's not actually a _Doctor Who_ reference, actually. I believe it _'s_ originally from _Star Trek_ , but I remember the concept best from the _Star Wars_ novel _Death Star_ by Michael Reaves and Steve Perry. By the way, I wholeheartedly recommend that book. I'm not that much of a Star Wars fan, but that book is pretty damn good.**

 **1\. A reference to the famous science-fiction novel (and one of my personal all-time favourites)** ** _Dune_** **. The iconic gigantic sandworms of the novel are called Shai-Hulud by the Fremen who live in the deserts of the titular planet.**

 **2\. Anyone who has played through** ** _Sir Hammerlock's Big Game Hunt_** **will know what this alludes to. I haven't, but I knew. I watched a clip on YouTube, partly to get a feel for Nakayama's character, and partly, well, to see the fall of Nakayama. And it was funny.**

 **3\. Why couldn't Captain Scarlett fire upon her attackers when you arrived? And why, in her introduction, did she seemingly shoot a man for no reason? I decided to knit these two apparently unrelated events together.**


	6. Chapter 5: Herbert the Pervert

**CHAPTER 5:**

 **HERBERT THE PERVERT**

It had been decided to split our party, such as it was, in two. Krieg, Gaige, Steve, Sir Hammerlock, and Tim would head into Hayter's Folly to track down Sandman and his compass piece. Myself, along with Angel, Moxxi, and Tina, would head to the Rustyards, and track down the former crewmember of Captain Scarlett. We'd stayed in her ship overnight, having learned that Moxxi and Scarlett had once been paramours. Compared to Handsome Jack, Scarlett was a better companion, I would have reckoned. For all her hints that she may betray us, she was probably more sincerely affable and jocular than Jack. I still found it a little hard to trust her, though.

When I voiced my concerns to Moxxi (who was using a purple umbrella to shield herself from the sun, of all things!) as we trekked through the Rustyards, so called because there were more wrecked ships (and other rusted vehicles) in this area than in any other part of the Wurmwater and Oasis region, she shrugged. "Well, you're probably not wrong. For someone like Scarlett, she's quite blunt and honest. She used to be a pirate on Eunomia, and used treachery to make her way up the ranks. Her father dropped her out of an airship, though. That's how she lost her eye. Long story. He was gutted by what happened next."

"Let me guess, _she_ happened. She literally gutted him," I muttered.

"Good guess. And yes, she did. Let's just say that she probably won't stab us in the back until she thinks she can get the treasure. She's a pragmatist when it comes to betrayal. Which is why, after we get this piece of the compass, and get you two hitched, we'll send both of you and Tina back to Sanctuary. You should be safe there, and I think we can look after ourselves." Moxxi pursed her already full and sensuous lips. Instead of making her look thoughtful, it merely made her look like she was pouting. "Anyway, I've got a feeling she's sent us to do more than persuade Herbert to give us his part of the compass."

Angel nodded, eyeing the package Moxxi kept with her. Scarlett had had us take it with us, and said to give it to Herbert when the time was right. "I can feel the electronics on that. ECHO-detonated explosive, right?"

"Probably. I know a bit about Herbert, as I knew Scarlett shortly after he got kicked off her ship. He is…imagine my son, older and more insane and obsessed. I heard he kept pestering some poor girl called Laney White(1), who fled to join the Rats in the Fridge. But Scooter is relatively harmless. He prefers to send bad poetry, crappy love letters, and rotten flowers. Herbert…apparently he taped Scarlett while she was sleeping."

"That…is a whole different kind of creepy," Angel remarked with a shudder. "And having known what it was like to be obsessed over by at least two men, I know what I mean."

I grimaced. "Hey, I didn't stalk you."

"I didn't say that! But…I know obsession. I saw it every day. And to be fair to you, you at least set me free. Of course, I did sometimes watch you, when Jack wasn't paying attention."

"Oh great," I said facetiously. "My girlfriend slash fiancée is a voyeur."

"And right about now, Krieg would be yelling some non-sequitur at the top of his lungs," Moxxi snarked.

"LOVE IS IN THE AIR!" Tina cheered in her best imitation of Krieg's feral growl, pumping her fist into the air.

"Thank you, Tina," Moxxi said with a touch of acid to her voice.

"You're welcome," Tina said with her cheery, cheery grin. Not for the first time, I wondered how true my theory that Krieg and Tina were father and daughter was. You wouldn't invite them to dinner (though Tina, you could invite to a tea party), but there was nobody you'd sooner have at your back on Pandora.

* * *

Herbert's house, little more than a shack, was perched precariously on a clifftop in the Rustyards. After getting to an elevator, we took it up, went up to Casa de Herbert, and knocked on the door.

"Hold on, hold on a second," groused a rather guttural voice. Then, the door emerged, and a most mephitic, hunched-over old man emerged. Dressed in ragged and stained clothing, one eye bulging and with cataracts, the other squinting and beady. His grizzled old face was heavily scarred, with what looked like the remnants of relatively recent brain surgery or something on his forehead. "Scarlett, is that you?" he asked hopefully.

 **HERBERT**

 **Don't Ask What's Wrong With Him. It's a Long List.**

Before we could say anything, with a tone of supreme disappointment, Herbert muttered, "You're not Scarlett…but I can taste her scent on you guys. She wants that compass piece, right? Well, let's talk, shall we?"

I peered inside his hut as he moved away from the door. And regretted it. Angel had joked about me being obsessed with her earlier, but there's that, and there's making a fucking stalker shrine. No wonder Captain Scarlett hated this decrepit old bastard.

* * *

Herbert decided that he wanted to sweeten the pill and show Scarlett how much he loved her, and so asked us to find some ECHO logs to prove his love. As he was the one holding the compass, he was calling the shots, unfortunately. And they were formerly on a barge, suspended over a ravine, which had exploded not long before we got here. So he sent us to get the ECHO recorders.

That was a mistake. The first one was Herbert's attempts at making a haiku. I wondered if he should have asked Zer0 for advice, but I doubt Zer0 would want to touch any haiku saying 'you got a nice butt' and 'you also got a nice chest'.

The second one turned out to be, disturbingly, Tape 48 in Herbert's 'The Sounds of Scarlett Sleeping' collection. Moxxi had mentioned this, but that he did this 48 times at least… Then again, hearing Scarlett snoring was amusing. Right up until Herbert made his lascivious comments. Ugh.

As we looked for the third one, I asked Moxxi, "How come he never came onto you?"

Moxxi shuddered. "He's single-mindedly obsessed with Scarlett. I've had some stalkers in my time, but if anyone did to me what Herbert did to Scarlett, I would've stuck them in the Underdome and unleashed hell. Actually, as a matter of fact, I did…"

She declined to elaborate, and it was probably for the best. Even Tina was getting creeped out, and this was a girl who thought nothing of having a varkid larva for a tea party, and rendering down a corpse to make explosives with.

The third one was admittedly one of the less creepier ones, although spying on your object of obsession through a telescope is still pretty creepy, especially in context. He mentioned how he watched as she duelled a crewmember who had stolen from her. She used a sword, he was given a gun. And she won. "I was there, sugar," Moxxi said, with a wry smile. "Believe me, she's good with a sword."

Unfortunately, the good humour ran out when we found the last one. That one was perhaps the creepiest of all: Mix Tape 206, specifically of Herbert singing a self-written song called _Scarlett, I Wanna Touch You In Places_. Needless to say, I decided to put on a better bit of music afterwards on my music player to try and erase the memory of that.

Scarlett sympathised when we called her. She called it 'musical gonorrhoea', and a more apt turn of phrase we couldn't think of. We didn't need her admonishment to wash our hands afterwards. Personally, I reckoned that I needed to dip my hands in some sort of acid. But it seemed that we had all the tapes.

As we trekked back to Herbert's house, I hit shuffle on the music player, and waited for the music. Anything would be better than Herbert's caterwauling. And as it happened, we walked back to the house to the gentle and melancholy tune of _You've Got to Hide Your Love Away_ by the Beatles.

Well, I don't have to hide it. Yes, Angel and I did have to hide from Jack, but we didn't need to actually hide our love. Or what I hoped was love.

It was spoiled when Herbert asked us what our favourite thing about Scarlett was over ECHO. He named her smile, her hair, her body, and the one time she made eye-contact with him. _Ugh_. But we decided to reply.

"Her candour," Moxxi said.

"Her hook!" Tina chirped.

"Her style," I said.

"Her élan," Angel said.

Herbert harrumphed, and said something along the lines of Scarlett being all his. I thought to myself that she could do considerably better than him. Hell, almost her entire crew at the moment would probably be better prospects than Herbert, though he set the bar pretty low.

* * *

We got back, and Herbert, delighted, showed us a chest with a lock on it. Unfortunately, it seemed that the chest's lock had jammed, and we had to shoot it off.

Moxxi held up her hand. "Hold up a moment. If we just start shooting things willy-nilly, we might damage the compass piece. Here, I'll give it a feel of my Bad Touch."

That, by the way, was her personalised SMG, capable of firing corrosive rounds. She knelt down next to the chest, carefully pulled the lock into position, and then fired. Thankfully, she avoided blowing her fingers off. Instead, the lock shattered, and the chest opened up to reveal the final compass piece. Intact.

We all let out a sigh of relief. As Angel took the compass piece out, Herbert said, "Now, give that to Scarlett. And don't forget those tapes! She'll love me again! And if she doesn't, I'll follow her, and I'll smell her, and I'll just MAKE her love me!" He began prancing around, laughing. Not a good thing to do when your house is on the edge of a cliff, though he managed to avoid falling off.

Everyone else shared a look. Then, we handed him the package from Scarlett, and backed away. "For you, from Captain Scarlett," Moxxi said.

Herbert's eyes widened as he gripped the package. He didn't notice that we were backing away rather hastily. "A gift? From Scarlett?! Oh, I KNEW she cared!" He ripped at the package, and that was when we ran for it.

KABOOM! Herbert vanished in a ball of flame, smoke billowing everywhere, and blood painting the walls of his now slightly charred shack. It was a marked improvement to the décor. " _Oh, sorry about that, Herbert_ ," Scarlett said rather insincerely. " _I'm sorry I didn't mention to you guys about the rather large bomb._ "

"We figured it out," I said. "Next time, try to tell us beforehand? It's no good if we get blown up with the compass piece."

" _True, that. Many apologies_ ," Scarlett said.

"Well, on a scale of 1 to 10 of people gettin' blowed up, that ranked maybe a three. Sorry, Cap," Tina said.

" _Well, I guess that you're the connoisseur._ "

"Well, hows about I shows you how it's really done." Tina got a rather feral gleam in her eyes, and then went into the shack with her box of grenades. She began singing her twisted little ditties that she did when working on something.

Moxxi, Angel and I exchanged a look, before backing even further away. Moxxi, from her cleavage, pulled a small camera out. When she saw our looks, she said, "You know this is going to be fun," before she started filming the hut.

Meanwhile, Tina was singing merrily. I didn't think it was Christmas, but that didn't stop her from singing her own version of _Jingle Bells_ , and specifically her version of the _Batman Smells_ variant.

" _Jingle Bells, Wilhelm smells,_

 _Angel flew away,_

 _I blew up the Jack-Mobile,_

 _And Roland got away…_ "

We didn't know what she was up to. Only that it meant pyrotechnics in the near future.

" _Set fire to all the ammos,_

 _A cartful full of Psychos,_

 _Kaboom-y, kaboom-y,_

 _They all blow up!_ "

And then, Tina began skipping out, her box of grenades considerably lighter. Seconds later, Herbert's shack erupted, shattering in a blast of smoke and flame. Tina was skipping towards us, silhouetted by the explosion, as badass as the world's deadliest 13-year old could be.

"… _Did you just blow up Herbert's house?_ " Scarlett asked. " _Nice._ "

I wasn't sure 'nice' is the adjective I would have used under the circumstances. Awesome, yes. And now I was glad Moxxi had that camera.

* * *

As we made our way back to the Fast Travel station, Angel seemed pensive for some reason. "What's the matter?" I asked her. "Is it because we effectively killed that creep?" Okay, Herbert was a creep and all, and not the sort of person who should breed, but I still found myself a little perturbed at his death.

She shook her head. "No. This morning, I couldn't hack into Dad's ECHO device again, or Nisha's. I think they discarded and destroyed them. Which means I can't track them. I've been listening to Hyperion's chatter, but they've upped security on the network. I think that's Dad's doing. Remember, he's a computer programmer. I'm mostly a better hacker by dint of my Phase-shift. Everything else, I learned from him, and experimentation. That's how he was able to keep me under control for all these years, how I had to stand by and watch as Steele unleashed the Destroyer, and help destroy New Haven. Any measures I used to overcome his control, he would come up with countermeasures. I was saving up some of my best, though. After what happened in Sanctuary, that's when I used them."

"So you mean we don't know where Jack is?" Moxxi asked.

"Not even Hyperion knows, and from what I can gather, some of them want to find Jack to kill him, some want him back in the office, and others want to capture both him and Tim to find out who is who. He is in some trouble in Hyperion already, though. Besides his ridiculous expenditure and rather brutal employee relations policy, which didn't help, he's now in trouble because my absence has hurt Hyperion's computer network. The sharks are beginning to circle, and that includes Jeffrey Blake."

I frowned. While I didn't see Vice President Blake that often, what I did see made me uneasy. The thin, dapper man was often called 'Jimmy' deliberately by Jack, instead of Jeffrey. While he would be a vast improvement over Jack in that he was sane and calm, he was also, if the rumours and my own impression of the man was any worth, utterly amoral(2). "Marvellous," I muttered.

"It'll be fine, sugar," Moxxi said with a smile. "With any luck, some Psycho will be feasting on Jack's body before sunset."

Personally, I thought that with our luck, Jack would crash the wedding. But I kept that thought to myself. Wouldn't want to dare the universe to make it true by speaking that thought out loud, would I?

* * *

When we used Fast Travel to get back to Scarlett's ship, she clapped her hands (well, as best as she could when one was a hook), and said, "Marvellous! You have your compass piece! And your friends are tracking down the second piece! Hyperion apparently have some convoy or other taking it out of here! So, your side of the bargain has been fulfilled! So, let's get to planning this wedding, yeah? It's going to be great!"

 **CHAPTER 5 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **Well, the quest for Herbert's tapes and his compass piece are over and done with. And yes, I deliberately set things up so that the whole 'poly-kryten' quest wasn't needed. I thought Moxxi, having some sense, would carefully shoot the lock off. I also thought that the party would be wary of Scarlett's 'gift' towards Herbert. And as for Tina blowing up Herbert's shack, that was something that occurred to me on the fly. Ditto with her singing her own versions of** ** _Jingle Bells, Batman Smells_** **and** ** _Ring a Ring o' Roses_** **. I was inspired by her own versions (transcribed in** ** _Hooked on a Feeling_** **from the game) of** ** _POP! Goes the Weasel_** **and** ** _I'm a Little Teapot_** **.**

 **Oh, and you guys are going to hate me for the next chapter. Just sayin'.**

 **Review-answering time. Now, I've already answered** **Darkstar248** **'s comments in correspondence, but I will answer them publicly and briefly. While Anthony Burch has declared the New-U stations non-canon, I have decided, like other fanfic writers before me, to integrate them into the story. They're just ludicrously expensive, and Snyder isn't sure whether he's on the system (Angel put him there) and would rather not go through the process of dying in the first place. And about slag being a potential element, keep in mind that I am speculating, through Snyder, about Sirens having elemental properties to their abilities, and I'm going with what Gearbox have chosen as 'elements'. Glad you enjoyed my chapters so far. :)**

 **MrGreen37** **: Yes, Angel does deserve happiness, and not her fate in the game. After reading about it, that was one of the reasons I wrote** ** _Hooked on a Feeling_** **. And Moxxi will get another hubby: Tim. Remember, I started shipping them in** ** _Hooked on a Feeling_** **. I'm hoping to have them together for the events of** ** _Mr Torgue's Campaign of Carnage_** **.**

 **Yes, I am aware that Steve can speak 'normally'. I have watched that video. I just decided to ignore it. :P I thought of him as an associate of the Zafords, though, rather than an outright member of the clan.**

 **1\. I feel sorry for poor Laney White. I knew something wasn't right with what Scooter had us doing during the mission, and I hadn't read up on that mission in advance. I find Scooter funny at times, true, but I personally find** ** _Claptrap_** **more endearing. Seriously, one of Scooter's missives you deliver to someone has the poor girl shoot herself in the head.**

 **2\. As those familiar with Blake will know, though, he is capable of surprising acts of benevolence, like warning TK Baha and Dr Zed to flee before Hyperion attacks. Blake will be important in the near future of this fic.**


	7. Chapter 6: A Wedding to Remember

**CHAPTER 6:**

 **A WEDDING TO REMEMBER**

I straightened out the suit jacket impatiently. The damn suit was too tight in the wrong places, and too baggy in others. I got the feeling that Scarlett had probably stolen it. I mean, she's a pirate. Stealing shit is her profession. She had other suits, but this was the best fit. I looked even more of a scarecrow than I usually did.

I remembered the admittedly well-tailored suit I had been made to wear when Jack sent me to liaise with the Vault Hunters, or rather, die with them. It was too hot in the desert, not warm enough in the frozen wastes, and the Hyperion logo on it drew more than a little ire from those dispossessed by Jack's actions. But it would have been more comfortable than this bloody thing. Unfortunately, my previous adventures had left the suit the worse for wear, and I didn't want to wear anything with a Hyperion logo on it anymore.

I had spent much of the previous evening with Angel, writing up our vows. Neither of us, we found, believed in any god. Whatever god or gods existed, they forsook Pandora and all those here. I was more of a misotheist, while Angel was probably closer to an agnostic. I guess she was the optimist of us. We decided to vow to stay together in the name of everything good in humanity and the universe. Not that there's much of that on Pandora, but there's enough. She also replaced the nugget of Eridium in her injector with a fresh one. Hopefully, once we got back to Sanctuary, she wouldn't need the small amount she had in her pockets.

Was I making a mistake? Was my love for Angel little more than shallow infatuation? I had, admittedly, been in love with the idea of Angel, as a sort of unattainable ideal. I vaguely remembered that a blue rose symbolised an unattainable ideal. I mentioned that idly to Angel, who got an interested look on her face. I was increasingly reminded of that old phrase, 'marry in haste, repent at leisure'.

In any case, was I truly in love with her? Now that I had Angel within my grasp, would I want to keep her?

I did know one thing. I wanted to keep her out of Jack's grasp. That was what mattered.

Roles had been assigned. Gaige and Mad Moxxi (who promised us one hell of a combined stag's night and hen's night after we got back to Sanctuary, funny considering it was going to be after the wedding) were going to be the bridesmaids (Moxxi giggled at the thought, saying she was no maiden), and Hammerlock my best man. I wouldn't have Krieg in that role, or Steve for that matter (can you imagine either of those in a suit?), and Tim, while he was a good guy, well, we had another role for him in mind. Tina leapt at the chance to be the flower girl. She was a bit old and a bit odd for the role, but hey, she didn't care. And frankly, neither did we.

The wedding was to take place on the main deck of Scarlett's ship, where folding chairs had been set up. I noticed that there were more sand pirates than Scarlett's crew seemed to normally have. When I asked about it, Scarlett said that during weddings like this, she invited some of her friends to them, including those outside her crew. I'm surprised that she had friends inside her crew, never mind outside. Moxxi could be considered a friend, true, but even she was wary of the pirate captain.

I took a peek outside the door at the deck, now a wedding chapel. A bunch of sand pirates were fidgeting and carrying weapons. Moxxi said that was nothing: her family, the Hodunk clan, considered weapons a standard accessory at a wedding, especially if the Zafords were poised to attack. The others were definitely armed, and I had my Maliwan pistol in my jacket, just in case. This wasn't a shotgun wedding per se, as nobody was forcing me to marry Angel, but there were shotguns, SMGs, pistols, rifles…an arsenal wedding. Probably standard practice on Pandora.

Hammerlock, like me, was dressed in a suit. "Nervous, old chap?" he asked.

"Well, wouldn't you be on your big day?"

"Hmm, I wouldn't know, Richard. I haven't met the right man yet(1)."

I glanced briefly at Hammerlock, shrugged, and then returned to straightening my tie. "Maybe one day you will. Good luck with that." He probably needs it, I thought to myself. Finding good men on Pandora was hard enough. Something told me finding a good man seeking same-sex companionship would be even harder. He once mentioned an old boyfriend of his who I had heard of: Eddie P Taggart, a so-called naturalist who liked to punch wildlife while studying it. Hammerlock could do better than that.

"Thank you, old chap. And I don't mind standing by a friend as he gets wed," Hammerlock said, cheerfully.

"Well…thanks, Sir Hammerlock," I said. "I'm…I'm actually touched you consider me a friend. Really. I don't have many of those."

"You have enough, old chap. The Vault Hunters, old and new, myself, Moxxi, Tina…and let's not forget Angel. As they say, you can choose your friends, but not your family."

"…My parents are dead."

"Apologies. Just trying to reassure you, Richard. And think of what this means to Angel: she is choosing to marry you, but she couldn't choose her father."

I nodded. He had a point. It didn't stop the butterflies in my stomach.

* * *

Hammerlock and I got into position. Scarlett stood, still in her captain's uniform, but it was pretty elegant, considering the usual life of a sand pirate, and she looked pretty good in it. And soon, Tina began walking down the aisle, such as it was, scattering petals. She had gotten into her role with aplomb, and she looked quite cute in that flower girl outfit. From speakers came the song _Tsubasa wo Kudasai_ , or _Please Give Me Wings_. Angel and I agreed on that being our wedding song. We wanted something less fatuous than the Bridal March(2). We wanted something that had meaning to us both.

And then, accompanied by Moxxi and Gaige, and escorted by a very dapper-looking Tim, was Angel, dressed in a bridal gown of spectacular beauty. She carried a bouquet, as did Moxxi and Gaige, of blue roses. I guessed that they were able to digistruct them or something.

She was so beautiful. I had thought she had lived up to her namesake before, but only now was she truly doing so. My Angel. Pandora's Guardian Angel. I wished she could show off her energy wings, so that she could look truly angelic, but Scarlett didn't need to know that she was a Siren. Which was a shame, really.

I thought it was a wonderful irony, having Tim, who looked like Handsome Jack, take Jack's place at the wedding. You know, giving his daughter away, something the real Jack wouldn't do. I wonder where the narcissistic bastard was? I wish he could be shown this to piss him off. But with him having destroyed his ECHO and Nisha's, we couldn't track him.

Once Angel had reached us, the music finished playing over the speakers, and Scarlett looked over those gathered. "Ladies and gentlemen, friends, family, and guests, we're gathered here today to witness the union in legal and binding matrimony of Richard Snyder, and Angel Clarke. Now, the lucky couple have written their own personal vows, so, let's get to it, shall we?"

I scrabbled in my jacket pocket for mine, while Moxxi fished from her cleavage Angel's vows. "Sorry," Angel said sheepishly. "We spent time writing them, not rehearsing them."

A small wave of laughter swept those present.

"Should I go first, or you?" I asked Angel.

"You embarrass yourself first, Ricky," Angel said with a smirk behind her veil, provoking another wave of laughter.

"LET THE BLOOD RUSH TO YOUR BRAIN, NOT YOUR CHEEKS, OR YOUR PENIS!" Krieg yelled.

"Behave, Krieg!" Gaige yelled at the Psycho.

"Heyooo!"

"And you too, Steve!" Moxxi snapped.

I glanced at Angel, and we both giggled, despite ourselves. So I looked to my notes, and tried to think of a way to make sure I didn't sound lame.

"Angel…long ago, I met a girl who was the first person, bar my parents, to believe in me, as anything other than a ticking time bomb. We were separated for so long, but I never forgot you. I dreamed of a day when we would be reunited, and never torn apart again. You helped me in my greatest time of need, and I tried my best to do the same for you. I swear to love and cherish you, no matter what the circumstances, until the day we die. This, to you, I solemnly pledge."

Angel looked up at me with a sad smile. "You did well," she said softly. Then, taking the notes from Moxxi, she began to recite her own vows. "Ricky…long ago, I met a haunted boy who, when he learned things about me, treated me with something other than fear or greed. He saw me as a girl. I was taken from you, and kept imprisoned. I dreamed of a day when we would be reunited, and never torn apart again. You helped me in my greatest time of need, and I tried my best to do the same for you. I swear to love and cherish you, no matter what the circumstances, until the day we die. This, to you, I solemnly pledge."

One of the sand pirates emitted a sound of disgust. It was all I could do not to roll my eyes at the interruption, as Angel might take it the wrong way.

"So, before we take the final pledge," Scarlett said, clasping her hands (well, hook and hand) together in a somewhat beatific gesture, "let's get the last little formality out of the way. If anyone here has knowledge of any cause or just impediment as to why these two shouldn't be joined in marriage, then speak now, or forever hold your peace."

I wasn't expecting any response. Neither was Angel, or any of our comrades. So it was to my complete and utter surprise when we heard a too-familiar, and very much unwelcome voice speak up.

"Actually, _I do_."

Suddenly, without warning, Krieg's head exploded into a fountain of gore and brain, splattering over those seated nearby. Another loud shot, and Steve's head dissolved into another gory blast faster than you could say 'Heyooo!'

One of the sand pirates, still wielding a smoking shotgun, suddenly plucked something from a pocket, and then threw it with unerring accuracy at Angel's neck. I stared in horror as I realised what it was: a control collar, and of a very familiar design. Angel screamed in pain, and sagged to the ground.

The other sand pirates got to their feet, and raised their weapons. Aiming them at us. And Scarlett, with an apologetic shrug, aimed her revolver at me. "Sorry about this. Really, I am. I would have preferred this to happen after the honeymoon. But, well, I got in contact with an old friend of mine. You might know her. Name of Nisha Kadam(3)."

My eyes widened in shock, and I turned to face the sand pirate who had murdered Krieg and Steve, and threw the collar at Angel. He was currently unwrapping the cloth from around his head all the sand pirates tended to wear. But now, I knew whose face was going to be revealed underneath it. And, well, I would say that I wasn't disappointed, but if I had been wrong, then disappointment was probably not what I was going to be feeling right now.

The man revealed in front of us had a pointed chin, and features that could be considered handsome. In fact, he made a point of reminding everyone of that fact. But the face was a false one, a life-like mask of plastic clipped over the real one with surgical clips. Angular and rakish, it was nonetheless the most unwelcome possible set of features I could have seen at any time, and especially now. I knew now that we were utterly fucked.

"'Sup?" asked Handsome Jack.

 **HANDSOME JACK**

 **Winner of 'Biggest and Most Narcissistic Douchebag on Pandora' Award**

I stared at him as he grinned victoriously. As impossible as it seemed, he had found us. And he had us at his non-existent mercy…

 **CHAPTER 6 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **Wow. I wonder how many of you saw this coming? Krieg and Steve dead (and, in case you're wondering, they're not respawning: you'll see why next chapter), Angel collared again, and Handsome Jack making an entrance.**

 **Now, I considered having Jack make a comeback after the honeymoon, or after the ceremony, but I thought it would be just like Jack to interrupt the wedding of his daughter, particularly at the 'forever hold your peace' bit. I probably got the order of vows and the liturgy mixed up, but artistic licence, right?**

 **Now, you guys will be wondering, why did I kill off Steve and Krieg? Well, Steve was a no-brainer: he's a one-note character (albeit an endearing and funny one) who says (save for that bit in the Claptrap web series) only variations on 'Heyo!' But what of Krieg? Well, from a story point of view, it makes sense that Jack will kill the biggest and strongest member of the party first. He's seen how Krieg acts, and is unpredictable, and so Jack decided to kill Krieg. Even with the entirety of Scarlett's crew on his side, there's no guarantee that they can subdue Krieg. Even Snyder, in the Sci-Zone, isn't as big a threat as Krieg, and Jack doesn't know about Angel's electrokinesis yet, though his collaring her is going to scupper any chance she has of that for the moment.**

 **From a writing point of view, I wanted to echo something of the moment when, in the game, Jack shoots Roland in the back. I want you to be shocked, and dismayed. And, most importantly, I wanted a Vault Hunter to** ** _die_** **. To make sure you remember what the stakes are. Because that's what Roland's death was: a wake-up call that reminded you, the player, of what the stakes truly were, and that where Angel is involved, Jack will NOT fuck around, whether she's alive or dead.**

 **I wonder if this is the moment where I've jumped the shark?**

 **When I post this chapter, I've finished the next two, but I want to let you guys stew quite a bit. I'm evil like that. :)**

 **1\. Hammerlock is canonically gay. I mention his old boyfriend Tanner from one of the sidequests he gives you, and Anthony Burch has confirmed it. I seem to recall reading about an internet Q &A that interviewed Handsome Jack, who stated that he was actually all for marriage equality. Probably one of his few remotely good traits, frankly.**

 **2\. I mentioned** ** _Tsubasa wo Kudosai_** **in** ** _Hooked on a Feeling_** **. I think it's a lovely, melancholy song, or at least the version on** ** _Evangelion 2.0: You Can (Not) Advance_** **is. I'm not so fond of the Bridal March though, mainly because it's rather fatuous.**

 **3\. A bit of information while I explain this. I originally considered having Shade betray everyone to Jack rather than Scarlett. The reason? He was driven mad by thirst and wanted to keep their company, and when they left, he contacted Jack out of petty revenge, only to get betrayed. Scarlett would have been forced to help the others against Jack. That all turned on its head when I researched Scarlett on the Borderlands Wiki. I learned that, according to Anthony Burch, Scarlett and Nisha were friends. I will elaborate on how they came to be friends in the next chapter (I don't know precisely what Burch said about them), but that sort of thing gave a very plausible reason for Scarlett to betray everyone. As she said, she would have preferred that Snyder and Angel got their happy moment before Jack acted, but Jack, being the prick he is, decided otherwise.**


	8. Chapter 7: Handsome Jack Strikes Back!

**CHAPTER 7:**

 **HANDSOME JACK STRIKES BACK!**

Now, I am sure that there have been many times when Mad Moxxi has had her breasts caressed and squeezed by men. And under relatively normal circumstances, I would have found it quite titillating to watch, pun unintended. But Jack squeezing Moxxi's breast hard enough to leave big bruises was definitely not titillating to me, or to many of those present. I could see a disturbing look of pleasure on Nisha's face, but even Scarlett, traitorous bitch though she was, was wincing in sympathy.

"Oh, I have missed doing this, Balloon Tits," Jack hissed. We (being Angel, myself, Moxxi, Hammerlock, Gaige, Tim, and Tina) were tied to chairs inside one of the storerooms in Scarlett's ship. "I wonder how hard I have to squeeze until they pop?"

Moxxi, biting her lip, snarled, "Unlike what you've got downstairs, they aren't fake."

Jack released her, and then turned to Nisha. "Nisha?"

Nisha nodded. A woman in her late twenties, she appeared to be of Indian descent, and the name made it explicit. Beautiful and slender, dressed as a sheriff from the Wild West (after she had discarded her sand pirate disguise), she removed a revolver from her holster, and then smashed Moxxi in the face with the butt of the gun.

 **NISHA**

 **Loves Gunfights and Lynchings**

Moxxi favoured Nisha with a glare, blood welling from a split lip, before saying to Jack, "Haven't got the guts to hit a woman?"

"You ain't a real woman, sweetheart," Nisha said almost affectionately. "Just a bandit with tits."

"And the thing is, if I kill you now," Jack said, "you won't come back." He patted his shotgun, a sleek bit of penis-substitution technology that screamed 'I'm gonna fucking kill you' at any potential victim. "Special E-Tech shotgun I've been developing with my people. Has all sort of electronics and Eridium conversion tech I don't really understand, but the upshot is, it disrupts the New-U respawn process. Even if you're in the system, you're dead. Those two earlier are dead for good. I've also taken your ECHO devices off you, so you can't call for help."

I caught some movement out of the corner of my eye, and saw a rather hunched-over wiry man with a bald pate and a beard examining Angel. "Don't touch her!" I snarled.

Jack came over to me, waggling a finger. "Uh, uh, uh, Dick! She's not _yours_. I don't allow my Dick to fuck my daughter! That is called incest, and is the province of bandits and idiots."

"Fascinating," the man said. "Really fascinating."

"Now, you see, Prof, why I say this has to be kept on the QT?" Jack said. "I'm gonna make Dick here an abject lesson. You'd better learn from it, okay?"

"Yes sir, anything you say!" the man said. Of course, he'd follow Jack into the depths of hell. I knew him all too well. Professor Nakayama, scientist and Handsome Jack fanboy.

 **PROFESSOR NAKAYAMA**

 **Handsome Jack's No. 1 Fan. Says it all, doesn't it?**

"So, she's an actual Siren, eh?" Scarlett said. "I thought something was fishy. Okay, I've heard of people tattooing themselves to look like Sirens, but still…that, plus she looked like the Guardian Angel."

"My proudest achievement," Jack said. "And the foundation of Hyperion's success. Since she was a girl, she always had a thing with electronics. D'you know how I first found out? Oh, she had had the tattoos all her life, and we knew she was a Siren then, though we just said it was birthmarks to cover it up. Do you remember, Pumpkin? The first time it happened was when you were four. Your mother and I forbade you from having any cookies because you were naughty. And we locked the cupboard with electronics locks, because, you know, need to stop kids or burglars from gorging themselves on everything in sight. But you know what Angel did? She just placed her hands on the lock, and willed it to open. Just like that!" He snapped his fingers to emphasise. "I caught her in the act, her tattoos and eyes glowing. It was so adorable. Spanked her pretty hard, though."

"Fascinating," Nakayama said. "And to think, she's your daughter! Well, of course she would be your daughter! No wonder she's a Siren! It was inevitable!"

I looked at Jack. "Have you had him tested? You know, for rabies or something?"

As Nakayama whirled to berate me, Jack gently placed a calming hand on Nakayama's shoulder, and said, "Well, not really, but even a rabid dog has uses, and Professor Nakayama here is much better than a rabid dog. Which, incidentally, is what _you_ are, Dick. Nakayama was one of the only people to believe me when I approached him about helping me after you asshats did your little broadcast. I have to tip my hat to you, or at least I would if I wore one. That was pretty good. Nisha nearly choked me to death. But, well, I persuaded her I was the real deal in the end." Jack rubbed his neck. "And don't get me wrong, I like some kinky stuff, but erotic asphyxiation ain't one of them, you know?"

"Not when it's being done to you, anyway," Moxxi said, her lip split and swelling more than it usually was.

"Moxxi, just do me a solid, and shut your fucking trap?" Jack sighed. "You knew how to be quiet when we were I bed."

"Only because I had you in my mouth," Moxxi said. "Should have bitten it off when I had the chance."

"Nisha?" Jack asked. Nisha nodded, and stepped forward, hitting Moxxi again with the gun. "Thank you, Nisha."

"Glad to be of service," Nisha said with a smile. "Can I string her up at the gates of Lynchwood?"

"I'll think about it. I was thinking of maybe embalming her corpse and using it to decorate my rebuilt arena in Opportunity," Jack mused. "You know, send out a 'don't fuck with me' message."

"Like bandits do?" Gaige asked acidly.

"Oh, you've got a smart mouth on you, kid," Jack said, going over to the young roboticist. "Smart brain too, to make that Deathtrap thingy. You know, if it weren't for the fact that you joined the Vault Hunters, I might have snapped you right up. I wouldn't have cared that you were a fugitive. But the thing is, you decided to hunt for the Vault with those other morons, and that wasn't smart. As it is, I think I'll do very nicely handing you in for the bounty on your head. How much was it? 820 billion or something? Marcie's daddy has very deep pockets, doesn't she?"

"You leave her alone!" Tina yelled, wriggling in her chair.

"Oh, yes. Roland's little pet," Jack said. "I remember you too. Sweet little thing, Dr Samuels had to be forced to work her magic on you. Blew up part of the lab when you escaped. Caused a lot of damage then. And you blew up part of my train tracks. Very expensive. I wonder what Roland and those other Vault Hunters will think when I show them your head mounted on a stick? Or maybe I won't. Maybe I'll finish what I started, and pump you so full of Eridium, God only knows what will happen. Maybe you'll be like Bloodwing! Or it'll make you crazy. I dunno, you're pretty crazy already. Maybe it'll make you sane. Or make you grow another eye or something."

"You really are without scruples, aren't you, Jack?" Hammerlock asked.

"Look, Hammerlock, you, I ain't got much of a beef with. But I'll still blow your head off. Your sis will thank me for it."

"I have no doubt about it, old chap. No wonder you got along so well with her. She doesn't have any scruples either."

Jack rolled his eyes, and then turned to Tim. "And you. I gave you one of the best jobs in the world, being me, and this is how you repay me? Teaming up with bandits? Nisha and Wilhelm, at least, repaid my trust in them."

"Says the man who doped Wilhelm up with siralanomode and sent him to get killed by us," I muttered.

"Ah, yes. Clever Dick," Jack said, turning to me. "Not feeling so clever now, aren't you?"

"Having the best day of my life ruined does tend to have that effect," I snarked back.

"Well, that's the thing, Dick. You don't get to have any good days, never mind any best days, without my say-so. And quite frankly, you won't be having anything but reeeally bad days from now on. And I do mean days. That's how long it'll take you to die, at the very least, for stealing my daughter from me."

"And deflowering me," Angel said quietly.

Thankfully, Jack looked away from me, or he would have seen the brief look of surprise on my face, which I quickly stifled. "…What?" he asked, in a low, dangerous tone.

"Oh yes. Back in Oasis. I mean, you _did_ say I would spread my legs for a monster," Angel sneered. "I thought, 'Why not?' Oh, it was wonderful, Dad. He was so considerate and eager to please, and he can do these amazing things with his hands and tongue that…"

"ENOUGH!" Jack screamed, absolutely livid.

"OH, RICKY! OH GOD, YES! THIS FEELS…SO GREAT! I'M…I'M COMING!" Angel screamed back in faux-pleasure. "Oh, OH, OHHHH!"

I don't know what Angel was thinking. But Jack whirled to face me, raising the shotgun to my face, before he saw something in my eyes. His face, or at least his mask, twitched. He then turned back to her. "You're lying. I saw a certain surprise in his face. Fear, yes, but believe me, I've caught people _in flagrante delicto_ before, and Dick hasn't got that look. Different kind of 'oh shit' faces. Which is only a real small consolation for him, as his death is only going to be a bit quicker. I think I would have used cheese graters otherwise." Then, his face became a mask of concern. Genuine concern coming from Jack, but it was a twisted concern, not really having the qualities of true concern. "Sweetheart…" he said quietly, "why did you lie to Daddy? Why did you disobey me?"

Angel looked him in the eyes, and then said, "If you have to ask me, then you'll never understand."

"Try me."

She looked at me, and then at her father. "Think about what you did, Dad. We're not talking about Ricky now, or even me. Think about those people I watched you murder, who did little to deserve it. That man you used a spoon to scoop out his eyeball while his wife and child watched. Helena Pierce, whom you shot through the head after faking sympathy. All those technicians who worked on Control Core Angel." Her eyes narrowed. "And my mother."

Jack's face twisted. "That was you!"

"You made me do it!" Angel yelled back, tears streaming from her eyes. If she could have, she would have pointed at the collar he had put on her. "Because she wanted me not to be put in Control Core Angel! She was my mother! You made out as if I had killed her before you put me in there, and then, you had me kill her. How could you make me kill her?!"

"Because she wanted to take you away from me," Jack said quietly.

"And there it is. I'm your daughter, yes, but I'm not a child anymore. Then again, you never thought of me as a child. You thought of me as a tool. Do you know what it's like to force a child to kill their own mother? To kill innocent people?"

"They were bandits!"

"You keep telling yourself that, Dad! You claim to want to bring civilisation to Pandora, but at what cost? There's a difference between bandits and people who just want to live and survive here! Innocent or not, too many people have died!"

"Well, Pumpkin, it's about time that you've realised something," he said quietly, leaning in close. "That's what people **_DO!_** " He screamed the last word(1).

Angel flinched away, before glaring at him. "And Dad, it's about time you realised something. You're an asshole. And you'll always _be_ one." Suddenly, she convulsed in pain.

"Language," Jack growled, thumbing a button on his ECHO device, finishing using the pain inducer on the collar. Turning back to me, he said, "I'll have to give it to you, Dick, I never thought Angel could survive outside the Control Core. I have to applaud your ingenuity in making a mini-Eridium injector(2). It'll be so much easier to get her back to Control Core Angel this way. But the thing is, you did only half the job. The only way you could make sure you could keep Angel was by taking her from my cold, dead hands. I don't doubt that you would be willing to kill me, even outside the Sci-Zone, but you didn't. Tough break for you. I'll make sure I visit your grave every week, so I can piss on it."

Scarlett sighed in annoyance. "If you're quite done posturing, Jack? I'd like to get this little black comedy over and done with so I can get on with finding Blade's treasure. You did express interest in finding it, didn't you?"

"Ah, yes. Nisha?"

Scarlett had barely enough time to react before Nisha shot her in the leg, the flesh and blood one. With a scream of pain, she fell to the floor, the gun she had in her hand clattering away. "Nisha…the fuck?!" she demanded, her face screwed up in pain.

"What?" Nisha said with a shrug. "You were going to stab us in the back anyway once we got the treasure. Consider this a pre-emptive measure."

"And I don't like to share, especially not with bandits and pirates," Jack said. "Nakayama?"

"Yes, sir!" Nakayama saluted. He then activated something from his storage deck. And a swarm of duplicates of Jack began filing out into the ship. The sounds of the sand pirates dying en masse reached our ears.

"Come on, Nakayama," Jack said, switching the shotgun for his wrist-mounted lasers, similar to the ones Tim used. "Let's go shoot some scumbags. You've always wanted to shoot some mouth-breathers with me, right?" Nakayama nodded eagerly, scuttling out, a gun in hand. Jack turned to us, and shrugged. "The things I do for my loyal fans. Nisha? Keep an eye on these guys."

"Sure." As Jack walked out, Nisha looked at us. "Just give me an excuse. I know how to shoot in some pretty painful places, and non-lethally." She looked at us, looking disappointed. "No, really? Tim, I thought you'd have the balls to do something. I mean, we fought together on Elpis." A noise drew her attention, and she leapt out of the way as Scarlett, from the floor, drew her sword and slashed at Nisha's ankle, nearly taking out the Achilles tendon.

"Try me, you traitorous bitch!" Scarlett snarled, getting to one leg, her cybernetic leg.

"Don't mind if I do," Nisha said with a smile. "Anyway, ain't that the pot calling the kettle black, Little Miss Backstabber?"

As Scarlett readied her sword, and Nisha cocked the hammer of her revolver, I wondered whether this would help us escape. As it happened, it did. Only not in the way we expected.

Angel's eyes suddenly glowed, and she yelled, "NOW, LILITH!"

And then, suddenly, the world dissolved in a flare of violet light…

* * *

…Only for us to rematerialize within the town square of Sanctuary.

There, waiting for us, was a red-haired, golden-eyed woman, a Siren, in battered clothes, and holding a very familiar device. Dr Lilith Cashlin, former Vault Hunter, current bounty hunter and vigilante, and presently a very welcome sight. "'Sup?" she asked.

 **DOCTOR LILITH CASHLIN**

 **Fuck With Her, and Your Goose is Cooked.**

"You?!" Nisha yelled, and turned her revolver on Lilith, only for her to be suddenly enveloped in a sphere of blue energy.

"Quiet down," said another Siren, a woman with blue hair and pale eyes, dressed in a yellow, figure-hugging combat suit. And another welcome sight to boot. Maya.

 **MAYA**

 **Likes Reading, the Colour Purple, and Kicking Ass With Her Powers.**

Lilith then looked at Scarlett. "Now," she said, her fist glowing purple, "we can do this the easy way, or the hard way. The easy way is that you drop your sword, and we take you to Dr Zed, after which we will stick you in a cell. The hard way…well, I'll…" She was interrupted by Scarlett dropping her sword. "Well, that was quick and anticlimactic," Lilith said.

"Rather like sex with Jack," Moxxi remarked.

"Lilith, hurry!" Angel gasped, arching her neck, exposing the collar.

Lilith grabbed at the offending article, only to gasp and stagger back, shaking her hands from an electrical shock or something. "Motherfucker!" she snapped. She grasped it, and this time, didn't let go, despite the pain. With a scream of pain matched by Angel, she undid it, and threw it to the ground, grinding it beneath her boot.

Nisha fell out of Maya's Phaselock at about the same time, hitting the ground with a thud, her gun clattering away. With a swift kick to the head, Maya knocked the Sheriff of Lynchwood out cold.

I looked at Lilith, and said, quietly, "Thanks, Lilith, but d'you reckon you can save our arses _before_ the nick of time?"

"Nice to see you too, Doc(3)," Lilith said with a smile, picking up Scarlett's sword, and using it to free me. After freeing Angel and Tim, and handing Angel the sword, she then turned to me. "Help me get Pirate Jenny here to Dr Zed's," Lilith said. "Then, we need to talk…"

 **CHAPTER 7 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **I was seriously trying to think of a way for Snyder, Angel, and company to get out of there. Then, I remembered the 'Siren projection device' from** ** _Hooked on a Feeling_** **. Nothing says that a Chekhov's Gun cannot be fired twice. Jack did take away their ECHOs, but I remembered that Angel could link herself to the ECHOnet without one, as mentioned earlier in the story. No, seriously, I wrote that in on a whim, without realising that I had just given myself part of an out. I'll explain the plan, and why Angel seemed to nearly provoke Jack into killing Snyder, in the next chapter. There is a reason for the latter, by the way.**

 **One of the things I wanted to give Jack was that he does remember some of the people whose lives he screwed over. Not all of them (while writing this chapter, I watched a YouTube video compiling some of Holo-Jack's scenes from** ** _Tales of the Borderlands_** **, and he has difficulty remembering Nakayama and Vasquez), but with Tina especially, I wanted an aversion of that 'But For Me, It Was Tuesday' thing. Especially as Roland is basically Tina's adoptive father.**

 **I also wanted to give him some of his more vile moments here (not that he needed any more), hence his basically assaulting Moxxi.**

 **How he killed Krieg and Steve (permanently, anyway) was originally different. I had this idea that he had shut down the New-U system, or else removed them from it, or even gave their credit rating a blacklist. Eventually, I just decided to go with a specially developed E-Tech gun that disrupts and stops any respawn. Which actually helped with why I had Angel provoking Jack later in the chapter. Let's just say that the shotgun should have been given the brand name of Chekhov.**

 **Review answering time:** **MrGreen37** **wondered if Herbert was really that creepy in the game. I actually glossed over part of it, so if anything, he is creepier. No, seriously, the ECHO logs I mentioned are what he has you collect in** ** _Captain Scarlett and Her Pirate's Booty_** **. You listen to them. It has been a while since I played the DLC, so I did watch a compilation of Herbert's scenes on YouTube, so if you want to understand how bad he is, go look it up. Believe me, I was glad he got exploded.**

 **Wolfgang8624** **: Okay, it was a bit contrived and forced. But the fact is that, while Roland is a hero to many, Krieg is not only a popular character with many fans of the games, he was also a comrade to many of those present. Snyder, while he couldn't consider Krieg a friend, would by this point trust the Psycho to watch his back. So too would Angel, Tina, Moxxi, Hammerlock…you get the picture.**

 **I didn't want Krieg to have any dignity in death. That was the point. In fact, I'd bet any money that Jack did awful things with Roland's corpse after Lilith sent the Vault Hunters back to Sanctuary in the game. Roland's death wasn't really dignified. He got shot from behind, looked down rather stupidly at the exit wound in his chest, and collapsed. Poor sod didn't deserve that.**

 **And as for the choice of Jack's target, namely, Krieg's noggin, well, he wanted to make sure that Krieg was dead. Krieg was easily the most dangerous person there, and Jack wanted to kill him quickly and efficiently. Steve, he killed because he was close by, and unlike the others, Jack didn't have a reason for keeping him alive.**

 **Sorry for the wait for this chapter. I did want to keep you in suspense, but here's hoping that this chapter helped make up for it.**

 **1\. This is a variation on a line from** ** _Sherlock: The Great Game_** **. When Moriarty discusses the 'game' he and Sherlock have played, Sherlock says, in cold outrage, that people have died. Moriarty, quietly at first, but shouting the last word, says, "That's what people** ** _DO!_** **" I was tickled pink to see the same line, albeit delivered with all the words shouted, in the trailer for episode 2 of** ** _Tales from the Borderlands_** **. But I decided to have Jack deliver it in the same way as Moriarty did in** ** _Sherlock_** **.**

 **2\. Jack doesn't know that, although Snyder had the** ** _idea_** **for using a miniaturised Eridium injector, it was Dr Zed who actually jerry-rigged it. Of course, Jack wouldn't give a shit anyway.**

 **3\. These two lines are based on a similar pair of lines spoken at the beginning of part six of** ** _Doctor Who: The Mind of Evil_** **. After being saved by the Brigadier, the Doctor says "Thank you Brigadier. But do you think for once you can manage to arrive BEFORE the nick of time?!" The Brigadier, with a smirk, says, "It's nice to see you too, Doctor."**


	9. Chapter 8: Tiny Tina, Matchmaker

**CHAPTER 8:**

 **TINY TINA, MATCHMAKER**

I sat in a booth in the corner of Moxxi's, nursing a glass of beer. Moxxi, Hammerlock, and Angel were with me. A silence, born of shock, had fallen. Angel had managed to tap into Jack's ECHO device, and learned that, after our disappearance, he intended to head to Magnys Lighthouse in the morning (it being afternoon now, and a long trek to the lighthouse), although he destroyed the Fast Travel station on Scarlett's ship just in case. We decided to do the same, wait until the morning until we dealt with Jack. We would hold the funeral for Steve and Krieg later, once this messy business had been dealt with. Jack had headed to Washburn Refinery, the main Hyperion facility in the area, to bunk down for the night.

Eventually, I broke the silence, anger filling me up. "Angel…why did you say all those things to Jack? I mean, we haven't even gotten past first base yet. He could have killed me!"

She looked at me, before looking back down to her glass. "I'm sorry. I couldn't tell you, not in front of Jack. Even that machine code program I put into your head needs an ECHO device for the codec program. But…that damned collar…Jack couldn't control me completely, thankfully. And there's a thing about weapons and electronics: don't put too much of the latter in the former. That shotgun of his had electronics galore, and a lot of security flaws. I was able to very carefully Phase-shift to avoid triggering the collar, and rig it up in just the right way. It was a booby-trap, ready to explode in Dad's face without hurting you. That's why I provoked him. I hoped he would pull the trigger, and blow himself to Kingdom Come. Unfortunately, he hasn't used it yet as far as I can tell. He's probably saving it for us."

I looked at her, still angry with her, before looking away. She was right. Oh, it was a major risk, I'd bet, but she certainly couldn't warn me without warning Jack. "I thought I was gonna die," I said quietly, tears welling up in my eyes. "Just for a second. I thought you'd gone mad, pissing him off that badly while we were tied up and he was armed."

"Yeah, well, I had the back-up plan. I disabled the anti-respawn device on the gun too, just in case. We're still on the New-U system."

"Angel, I'd rather not die in the first place. I don't like the way New-U providers dodge the existential questions."

"Sugar, that's what a strong drink is for," Moxxi said quietly. Thankfully, the health vials from a Dr Zed vending machine healed up the injuries Nisha and Jack inflicted on her, and she had retouched her makeup. But they couldn't heal the emotional hurt, the violation of Jack assaulting her like he did. Moxxi revelled in sex and her sexuality, but what Jack did to her was not what she had in mind.

"Indeed," Hammerlock said, looking at his brandy.

I looked up at Moxxi. "Did you know Scarlett was friends with Nisha?"

"No. If I had known that, I might have been a bit more careful," she said quietly. "I also thought she wouldn't stab us in the back until after we'd found where the treasure was. Not that it would do much good. There're legends of a beast called the Leviathan, said to guard Blade's treasure."

"Another of the reasons I went to Oasis," Hammerlock admitted. "The chance to potentially study a legendary creature like the Leviathan…"

"It's a moot point now," I muttered. "Let's hope that Leviathan eats Jack."

"Ricky, Jack's a bastard, but he's not an idiot," Angel said. "He'd probably send Nakayama, or else send for some Loaders by moonshot, to wherever the treasure is."

"Should have asked Lilith to Phasewalk us out of Oasis as soon as we got back in contact," I muttered.

"Ricky, Phasewalking takes a lot out of her, especially transporting a city like Sanctuary. Once everything went south at Scarlett's ship, I contacted her with my Phase-shift. We were lucky she was not far from Frostburn Canyon's Fast Travel station while out on patrol. She hauled ass to get to Tannis and the Eridium she needed to boost her abilities. She also called Maya back in, just in case she needed to Phaselock someone."

I grunted, before getting up from the booth, and walking away. "Ricky, where are you going?" Angel asked.

"I need to be by myself," I said, rather sullenly. "I need to think."

* * *

And think I did, as I walked through the streets of Sanctuary.

Angel, by doing what she did, managed to save our lives. But even so, Steve and Krieg were dead. Admittedly, they were by no means the most upstanding of men: Steve was a bandit, and from what I had been told, an occasional enforcer for the Zafords. And Krieg…well, he spouted nonsensical phrases at the top of his voice while eviscerating people left, right, and centre. But if he was on your side, then you had a loyal and powerful ally. And he was a tormented man. I hoped that he had found peace, even if it was only in oblivion. They had both been killed because a petty man wanted to make Angel and I suffer.

I sat down on a bench inside the main station of Sanctuary, where the Fast Travel station was, and contemplated the floor. I was still angry with Angel because she made me feel afraid for my life. Of course she couldn't tell me why at the time, but still…

The sound of skipping feet, and then, someone sat down next to me. "Whatcha doin'?" came the familiar voice of Tiny Tina.

"Thinking," I said quietly, trying to rein in my exasperation. I wanted to be by myself.

"Yeah, I do that a lot," she said, swinging her legs up and down. "'Cept when I don' wanna. Sometimes, I think what it mighta been like. Life, you know? Like if Flesh-Stick didn't sell out my folks, or if they didn't gimme that grenade, or maybe Roland died in Control Core Angel…" She looked down at the floor. "And y'know what? Life…it's a thing. You hafta try and get through it as best as you can, preferably with a lot of explosions."

"You'd like Torgue, wouldn't you?" I asked, a wry smile on my face.

"Duh. 'Course I do. I wanna interview him one day," Tina said with a smile(1).

I looked at the girl, and then back at the ground. "Tina…" I said. "You do know who Krieg may have been?"

"…Daddy."

I looked at the girl, surprised, before I asked, "How did you…?"

"When Gaige and I were in that hotel room in Oasis with Tim, she said you found those ECHO logs of Doc Samuels," Tina said, her voice quiet. "She also said you looked at Krieg funny after that, like you saw a ghost. And she guessed." She bit her lip as she looked back at the ground. "I dunno if Krieg was Daddy. I mean…he could've been…I saw some things that coulda been Daddy…but…Daddy died to me ages ago. If Krieg was Daddy, then, well, we got to play some more."

"I'm sorry, Tina."

"You ain't the one who needs to be sorry. Jack does."

"Not like he'd ever say sorry."

"I know." Then, she said, "You _are_ in love with Angel, aren't ya, Doc?"

"I thought I was," I said to Tina. "But…I'm not so sure. I'm not sure if what I feel is love, or just an obsession that led me to this. I'm worried that I'm not good enough for her, that I won't ever be. I mean, now that I have her here…I mean, you do understand what I'm talking about, Tina?"

"Yeah, yeah, I get it," she said. "You care about her a lot, and you're worried you ain't good enough for her. Doc, you went to all that trouble to get her out of her cage alive! Seriously, I wish I coulda seen it!"

For a moment, we sat there in silence. Then, she said, "Y'know what'd make a great evening in for you two?"

"What?" I asked, dreading her answer. Knowing her, it'd probably involve explosions, sex, or stuffed toys.

"A game of _Bunkers and Badasses!_ " she said.

Well, I didn't expect THAT.

* * *

"20!" Angel yelled in triumph, looking down at the die.

"Critical hit! Your spell hits the Handsome Sorcerer, and causes him to disintegrate in a shower of blood and gore. Congrats, you just committed patricide!" Tina cheered. She was probably one of the few people in the universe who could make patricide sound like a good thing. Then again, considering that the Handsome Sorcerer was blatantly based on Handsome Jack, Angel committing patricide would probably do the universe in general a favour.

I'd never played _Bunkers and Badasses_ , and neither had Angel. Oh, I was aware of the game, its history, and the general way the game was played, but I generally preferred to play video games when it came to RPGs. Angel had looked over the rules and watched a few games being played over the ECHOnet while bored in Control Core Angel. As it turned out, Angel was a far better player than I was. When it came to combat, I had to admit to being pretty fucking inept. I was better at the roleplay part of the game, though. A bit too hammy, but I was better at getting into my character than I was in fighting off skeletons.

Tina was, as far as I could make out, something of an amateur Game Master, being somewhat uneven with what enemies and loot she put in. But you couldn't deny her imagination most of the time, though she tended to put versions of people we knew in it.

Lilith, Roland and Tim had joined us. Both of the first Vault Hunters, strangely enough, had played _Bunkers and Badasses_ before, starting from a young age, admitting they got bullied because of it. Lilith, I could sort of imagine, but Roland(2)? Then again, you could see it a bit in his occasionally awkward and dorky demeanour. Tim wasn't actually playing, but he occasionally voiced the other characters, and voiced the Handsome Sorcerer, whom he was currently giving a good death rattle. I'm surprised he wasn't with Moxxi, as the two had grown close. Then again, given what Jack did to Moxxi, I couldn't blame her if she wanted Tim to keep his distance.

I'm surprised Gaige didn't want to play, but she decided to join Moxxi and Hammerlock at the bar. Bad day, really. I knew Gaige had a crush on Hammerlock, but he was old enough to be her father, maybe even her grandfather. And, of course, there was the fact that he was gay. I guess she just wanted to try drinking.

I played Victor, the half-mad wizard, while Angel played Seraphina, the Handsome Sorcerer's daughter, warlock witch and MacGuffin-keeper. Roland played Oliver, the White Knight, and Lilith played Morrigan, a cleric of all things(3).

Tina had put in a pair of characters like Krieg and Steve: Blood-Drink the Barbarian Hero, and Sam the Thief Prince. Maybe that was her way of coping with their deaths. Hell, she even managed to put Bloodwing into it, which was cheesy, but awesome. Mordecai would have liked it, but he and the other Vault Hunters were currently trying to get into the Hyperion Info Stockade. Maya had returned to them earlier.

"No!" Tim gasped and gurgled. "Why? This cannot be! I'm so handsome, I am invincible! UNGAAHHHHH!(4)"

I was pulling double-duty, not only as a player, but as the music provider, given my music player, which was connected to the room's speakers. I played the victory fanfare from the _Final Fantasy_ series. It probably made up for my ineptitude in battle.

It was weird, really, playing _Bunkers and Badasses_ only a short while after seeing Krieg and Steve die, and having a wedding interrupted. And strangely therapeutic. I was beginning to feel better.

"And now, you guys go through the gate. As you step over the corpses of the unfortunate knights who tried to murder the queen, you know you've come to the right place. For who else can possibly bring the light back to the world? Who else but the most beautiful, most glamorous, and most graceful queen in history…BUTT STALLION!"

Everyone at the table shared a look of bemusement. I didn't even know that Tina knew about Jack's diamond pony. But there she was, pushing out a rather pretty crystal figurine of a pony out onto the board.

"Wow," Angel said. "Looks like the real thing. And believe me, I know what she looks like."

I knew it was possible to have a pony made out of diamonds, and a living one at that. Most of the actual processes involved in making one eluded my understanding, but I knew it was like a top-quality gigolo: long, hard, and expensive. I'm surprised Jack didn't make some innuendo to that effect when he first discussed Butt Stallion. Then again, calling an expensive diamond pony Butt Stallion in honour of my comrades-in-arms was the sign of a man who had more petty concerns on his mind at the time.

* * *

We wrapped up the game rather late. Angel and I walked back to our quarters, my arm around her shoulders. I didn't even realise I had done that until we had gotten to our rooms. After an awkward pause at her door, I let my arm fall from her shoulders, and said, "Well, good night."

As I turned to head for my room, Angel said, "Wait." As I turned around to look at her, she said, "Ricky…are you still angry with me?"

After a moment, I realised what she meant. "No. No, not anymore. Anyway, this happened before, right? The whole 'getting angry with the other person because they didn't tell you the whole plan', remember? You got angry when I got you out of Control Core Angel, because I didn't tell you the whole plan. I…felt the same way, I guess, given what happened today. Probably not as much, you were pretty angry then, but…"

"…I understand." She looked down at the floor, and I noticed a faint look of embarrassment come over her face. "…Were you embarrassed by my words?"

"Well…wouldn't anyone?" I asked, rubbing the back of my head. "You sounded like something out of a bad porn film."

"That _was_ the idea," she said, smiling a little sheepishly. "That night before Sanctuary got attacked again, and we ended up in Oasis…you slept with me. Not like that, obviously, but…can you do that again, please?"

"Anything for you, Angel," I said, smiling. I leaned in and kissed her. And, well, things got a bit interesting after that. We didn't hit a home run, if you want to use the baseball metaphor, but we were beginning to get a bit more comfortable with each other. Not quite enough to go all the way, or even most of the way, but still. All I could think, as we lay in bed, with Angel draping her arms over me, _I'm so goddamned lucky_.

Of course, things were going to get ugly tomorrow. It just made our increasing intimacy all the more poignant. I hoped that I would stay the course with her, now and forever…

 **CHAPTER 8 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **An interlude with the fallout from Krieg and Steve's deaths, Angel and Snyder's relationship being tested, and yes, Tiny Tina hosting a** ** _Bunkers and Badasses_** **game! I haven't played that particular DLC yet (I am yet to finish the main game), but I thought it would be sweet to show something along these lines. Much of that DLC is Tina trying to cope with the loss of Roland, but here, Tina doesn't know Krieg or Steve as well. In fact, she plays more of a counsellor to Snyder and Angel than being counselled. Plus, Roland playing** ** _Bunkers and Badasses_** **! Angel and Snyder getting more intimate! And Butt Stallion!**

 **Now, I'm sorry I haven't updated this recently (despite having this chapter finished and all but ready to publish). There's a few reasons for that. The first is that I have started yet another story, a Harry Potter fic called** ** _In Spite of Obstinate Men_** **. The second is that I got distracted by the Steam Summer Sale, where I got (amongst other things) the remaining Headhunter DLC I didn't have for** ** _Borderlands 2_** **, along with the GOTY edition of the original** ** _Borderlands_** **. The third is that I managed to finish both the first four Headhunter missions, as well as** ** _Sir Hammerlock's Big Game Hunt_** **. The fourth is that I finally got some inspiration for one of my novels, and frankly, non-fanfic takes a priority over fanfic. Sorry.**

 **1\. A reference to what actually happens in** ** _Mr Torgue's Campaign of Carnage_** **. I love it when Tina does her own interview of Torgue while Torgue is trying to interview Moxxi. Especially when Tina stops the interview and says 'goodnight', and when Moxxi tries to pick up where they left off with Torgue, Torgue yells "TINA SAID GOODNIGHT, MOXXI. SHOW'S OVER!" Moxxi's reaction says it all: "Motherfucker!"**

 **2\. I haven't actually played** ** _Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep_** **as of writing this, but I have seen the opening movie. Given how eager Tina was to wait for the late (in more ways than one) Roland, and given how much of a father figure Roland was to Tina, I actually thought, wouldn't it be interesting for Roland to be the one who taught Tina how to play** ** _Bunkers and Badasses_** **? And if you're thinking that this is impossible, think on this: Vin Diesel used to play** ** _Dungeons and Dragons_** **. Yes, that is right. So it's not so much a stretch to believe Roland used to play a tabletop RPG.**

 **3\. I chose the names of the RPG alter egos quite carefully. Victor and Oliver are references to literature, with Victor being a reference to the archetypal mad scientist, Victor Frankenstein, and Oliver being the paladin friend and advisor of Roland, the great knight, in the medieval epic poem** ** _The Song of Roland_** **. Morrigan being Lilith's alter-ego should be obvious to any fans of the** ** _Darkstalkers_** **video games by Capcom. I chose the name 'Seraphina' for Angel because a seraph is a kind of angel. Quite by coincidence (after choosing the name), I discovered by punching the name into Wikipedia that Seraphina is also the name of a supervillain from the** ** _X-Men_** **comics who, like Angel, has technopathic abilities. And she is a member of an antagonistic group of superpowered people called Children of the Vault. How's that for serendipity?**

 **4\. The infamous death-cry of Emperor Mateus of Palamecia in** ** _Final Fantasy II_** **.**


	10. Chapter 9: Preparation

**CHAPTER 9:**

 **PREPARATION**

If there was one thing that I had to give Captain Scarlett, if I was feeling generous (and considering what happened, I _would_ have to be feeling generous), she knew when to throw in the towel. Still kept in a cell overnight, true, as we couldn't trust her an inch, but she was a font of information. It was decided to bring her with us. This time, Roland was accompanying us, with Lilith staying behind as a commander. And Scarlett would be kept ahead of us, so that she couldn't stab us in the back.

In any case, given that her crew had most likely been massacred by Handsome Jack and Nakayama, and she had been betrayed by Nisha, she had at least one additional motivation for coming with us without betraying us: revenge.

Angel insisted on coming with us again, despite what happened. I guess she wanted closure, to look Jack in the eye as we fought him again. To know that he was dead, and gone forever.

Scarlett's leg, thanks to Zed's ministrations, had healed up overnight, and she ran a hand through her red hair, no longer quite so immaculate. We were in the command room of the Crimson Raider HQ. "I've been researching the treasure of Captain Blade for a long time. In fact, he's left smaller caches of treasure all around the place, along with ECHO logs that are quite enlightening."

"How so?" Angel asked.

"Well, as it turned out, he was a bit of a softie for the most part. He used a fearsome reputation to scare people into giving up their treasure, true, but he was not fond of actually killing people. Part of that was for a good reason, really: if he got too infamous for killing, the authorities would have gone after him more, and he wanted to be loyal to his men. For example, some crewmember, a cook or something, was to be executed for stealing, but Blade secretly sent him off the ship. That came back to bite him in the posterior. Apparently, while at dock in Oasis, the crew spotted the cook alive and well, and made to mutiny. Now, at first, Blade said he was going to let them kill him in one ECHO log. But I found another ECHO log that said, well, he wiped out his crew to a man. That they met the real, ferocious Captain Blade." Scarlett pursed her lips pensively. "Now, that sort of turned him cuckoo. He was ranting about society being run by sentient tacos at the end."

"…Tacos?" I asked. "That's…crazy, and speaking as someone who is half-crazy, and who has known crazy people, that's really crazy. Even Krieg'd be hard-pressed to top that."

"Yes, well, unfortunately, he is in no position to do so. Sorry about that," Scarlett said with surprising sincerity. "Anyway, the compass is supposed to be assembled and taken to Magnys Lighthouse. The lighthouse will then send a beam of light to where the treasure is supposed to be."

"Okay, well, we'll make a deal," Roland said, crossing his arms. "You get the lion's share of Blade's treasure. But we get Jack, to deal with as we see fit. After that, we'll leave you to your own devices. And you leave us to our own. Otherwise, you join Jack as a guest of honour at one of Tina's tea parties."

"Prolonged electrocution is involved," I added helpfully, remembering what happened to Flesh Stick.

Scarlett blinked. "Well, I hope she likes imported tea, and not that Pandoran tea. I had a bad experience with one of those plants…"

* * *

Before we left, I went down with Angel to the cells. They weren't much more than storage rooms converted into cells. Nisha was clearly in some sort of pensive mood as we went up to the bars. Then, she looked up. There was no fear or anxiety in her face, or at least none that we could see. Instead, there was just irritation, an annoyance. "Come to gloat, have you?"

I looked at Nisha. "Not…really. I don't feel proud, not with this." I indicated the cell's door. "Though…being a sheriff and all, this must feel novel to you."

"Not really. I've been on both sides of a cell door," Nisha said. "So have both of you."

I looked at Angel, before looking back to Nisha. "Is this going to be one of those 'we're not so different' speeches?" I asked.

"I don't need to make a speech, Doc," Nisha said wearily. "You know that there's a monster within you. And d'you really think killing Jack is gonna solve all your problems?"

"Probably not," I admitted after a moment. "But it will solve at least one. If Angel stays by me, I'll have to deal with all sorts of arseholes trying to get to her. With Jack gone, the biggest arsehole will be out of the picture."

Nisha looked at me strangely, before she said, "I once had a puppy, you know. The only thing that loved me unconditionally. My dad gave it to me. It was the one comfort I had when my mother was throwing stuff at me. But then, it got bit by a frenzycrutch."

My eyes widened. That was bad, to say the least. "Oh, shit."

"That's what I thought too. Except, though its eyes went red and its lips turned blue, it didn't change its behaviour. At least not until the next time my mother threw shit at me. I got used to catching or deflecting that stuff, but I fumbled one of the things, and it hit the puppy. And it leapt onto my neck and started to gore me. After my dad patched me up, I took a shovel to that puppy's head, and beat the brains out of it."

Angel grimaced. "And the moral of that heartwarming little story?"

Nisha fixed us with a look. "The ones you love, they're liabilities. They always are. If they don't turn on you, then they'll be used against you."

"And what? You treat them like enemies first and foremost?" Angel snarled. "That's the mistake my father made. Did you think he was going to let you live after learning about me? Everyone else who learned I was the Guardian Angel was killed, or had him trying his best to do so."

Nisha laughed acidly. "Angel, I've known who and what you were since Jack made me Sheriff of Lynchwood. Oh, he said he'd confiscate my breathing privileges forthwith if I told another living soul, but I'm one of the few he trusted completely. That idiot Nakayama is another one: Jack may hate fanboys, but he knows how to use them."

Angel sighed, that one sound dripping with disgust. "Nisha, I may have had bad experiences with my father, but I trust Ricky with my life."

"Really? How long before he goes into the Sci-Zone again, and forget who you are, like my puppy? Before he cuts you up, while you're screaming for him to stop?" Nisha sneered.

"This is the guy who saved my life when I thought it impossible. Can you say the same about my dad saving you?"

Nisha looked down at her feet. "It doesn't matter. You guys are going to hand me over to Brick before long. That asshole's been itching to get his hands on me since I broke his puppy's neck."

"Well, you wanted to piss him off, if I recall, after torturing him to no effect," Angel said, folding her arms. "Congratulations on your success."

"You swore," Nisha said, looking at her.

"I did, didn't I?" Angel said quietly.

For a moment, we remained in silence. Eventually, Nisha said, "Could you be at least merciful?"

"What? Let you go?" I laughed.

She sneered. "Of course not. I know you guys aren't idiots. No, I want a quick, clean death. A bullet through the heart, or between the eyes. I don't care what Brick and his Slabs do to my corpse. I just don't wanna be in the building when it happens. Besides, the longer I'm alive, the more chances I have to escape. Think about that."

* * *

After that, we left Nisha alone, and went to the Fast Travel station. Lilith, Roland, Scarlett, Tina, Hammerlock, Moxxi, Gaige and Tim were all waiting. "I've got the Fast Travel codes for Magnys Lighthouse," Scarlett said, "but there's a load of pirates of Sandman's crew encamped there."

"So, it's not going to be easy," Roland commented. He had a gift for considerable understatement.

"Dad may have already got Loaders in to deal with them. Let me check. Phase-shift activated." Her eyes glowed eerily for a moment, before she nodded. "Yeah. It seems like he's managed to destroy the Sandman's crew. The good news is, we won't have to deal with the pirates. The bad news is, he has a shitload of Loaders. The bad news for him is, he has a shitload of Loaders, and you have a technopathic Siren who might be able to control them. Or at least get them to obey our commands. If we're lucky."

"Knowing our luck," Tim muttered, having deliberately kept his facemask off to avoid friendly fire (or unfriendly fire: friendly fire is such an oxymoron), "it'll end badly. For us I mean."

"Nintendo," Angel said.

I stared at her, before asking, "What does an old games company have to do with anything?"

"Everything. The name 'Nintendo' actually means, ' _Do what you can, but leave luck in the hands of heaven_ '(1)." Seeing my look, she shrugged. "What? I had a lot of time in Control Core Angel. I got bored. Did some reading. Dad actually encouraged it. He's all for reading." She rolled his eyes. "Of course, he misses the point of a good chunk of it. He thought _Dune_ was about how he could tame Pandora."

"Good book," Lilith said.

I nodded. "Could do with a giant sandworm chowing down on Jack."

"Anyway," Angel said, "what I mean is, we do our best. We can do little else. We get down there, and we stop him. There's an extra issue, though. Hyperion's getting antsy about Jack now. With me gone from Control Core Angel, Tim's broadcast, and his recent pissing money up the wall, there's looking to be a _coup d'etat_ in the boardroom."

"I think I can guess who the chief shark is," I muttered. "Blake, right?"

"I remember him," Roland said when he saw Angel nod. "Lilith and I met him during the Claptrap Uprising. Rather unpleasant man, but he paid us for our work at least."

"He's also capable of negotiation," Angel said, giving a rather shark-like smile. "Since we got back to Sanctuary, and I felt out the situation, I contacted him."

Lilith stared at Angel, anger beginning to ignite in her eyes. "What did you say?!"

Angel looked back at Lilith. "Lilith, if we just kill Jack, who's to say that Hyperion won't come after us in revenge? I'm laying down the groundwork for Sanctuary to be free from harassment. Jack's the biggest problem, true, but if we can get Hyperion to leave us alone, even ally with us…I'm not expecting any of you to be friends with Hyperion. But I'm trying to set up a treaty. Dad's hated throughout much of Hyperion. Oh, he has a lot of fans and sycophants, but there's also many who hate him. And didn't Ricky and Tim show you not all of Hyperion are bastards?"

"It would've helped if we were kept in the loop," Roland said mildly.

"Maybe, but you may have refused it anyway," Angel pointed out. "Blake has promised me that if we stop Jack, then he will get Hyperion to leave us alone. It won't stop all of them, obviously. Dad's poisoned the mind of so many. But Pandora is a big planet. It could have been enough even for the various corporations like Dahl, Jakobs, and Atlas." She turned to the Fast Travel station, and looked at it. "In a way, Dad had the right idea. But he failed to consider one thing."

"What was he right about?"

"The need to tame Pandora. But he was wrong about how to do it. People were already taming Pandora, one square foot at a time. Fyrestone, New Haven, Liar's Berg, Sanctuary, Lynchwood, all these places, people were keeping civilisation alive," Angel said quietly. "In rough form, true, but Dad just viewed them as savages and bandits, not as people who were trying to survive. He wanted to suppress this planet, rape it, make it submit to him." She rubbed her neck unconsciously, and I remembered the control collar she had been saddled with.

"And Hyperion won't do the same, even after Jack is gone?" Lilith asked, acid tinging her tone.

"I'm willing to risk that," Angel said. "I know Hyperion and its inner workings far better than anyone else here. I mean, being hardwired to their computer network does do that. And I know Blake is being sincere." She leaned over to Lilith and Roland, and loudly whispered in _faux_ -confidentiality, "His scalp gets itchy when he's lying. I once helped Dad beat him in a poker game knowing that."

I had no idea how true that actually was, but while I didn't trust Blake, I trusted Angel. Besides, it sounded like it would be a funny anecdote once elaborated upon.

But now was not the time for anecdotes. Now was the time to prepare for battle. A battle which might see the fate of Pandora turn out for better, or for worse.

I hoped it was the former.

 **CHAPTER 9 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **Well, the preparations for kicking Jack's arse have been made, Scarlett is going to help them, and Nisha divulges some of her past (derived from what she says about it in the Pre-Sequel). I didn't want to humanise Nisha: I frankly think she's a sadistic bitch, albeit an interesting one. But I wanted to have her get under Snyder and Angel's skin a little, Hannibal Lecter-style. And she also knows when to fold them. If she has the opportunity to escape, she'd take it, but if she can't, well…**

 **And Angel is making sure that Sanctuary won't be hounded by Hyperion. Time will tell whether or not it will backfire…**

 **Sorry for the rather slow chapter after a long period without an update. By the way, for any fans of Snyder going into the Sci-Zone, don't despair! He will go into it either in the next chapter, or the chapter after! Speaking of which, I'm releasing this one and Chapter 10 together.**

 **1\. This is what the word 'nintendo' actually means in English. It means 'leave luck to heaven'. Considering that, long before making video games, Nintendo made playing cards, this is rather appropriate for that company.**


	11. Chapter 10: X Marks the Spot

**CHAPTER 10:**

 **X MARKS THE SPOT**

Upon arriving at Magnys Lighthouse, I was struck by the vast mountain (or was it a plateau? Geographical nomenclature was never my strong point) in the distance, with the lighthouse on top. I was also struck by the smell of burning flesh. Jack had been busy with his small army of Loaders.

Scarlett took point, with Roland right behind her, looking every inch like the Crimson Lance soldier he had once been. Moxxi and Hammerlock took up the rear, and the rest of us were in the middle.

Lilith then spoke to us over ECHO. " _Hey, guys? A lot of activity up at the Lighthouse. This satellite hack you set us up with is great, Angel._ "

"Thanks," Angel said. "I've had a lot of practice. Sending a visual feed to Sanctuary's control room is a piece of cake. The last of the Sandman's forces are defending the Lighthouse, right?"

" _Yeah. The good news is, some of them got a clue, and started using corrosive weaponry. They're not going to survive, though, but it means that you'll have less Loaders to deal with. I mean, how many Loaders can you control, Angel?_ "

"A few. But enough to be able to attack precisely," Angel said. "The Loaders are rather clumsy. Hell, they call their attacks a lot, even more than some people we know. But under my control, they can attack precisely, and without notifying anyone of what they are doing."

"Do you think you can wait until after Sandman's forces are depleted?" Roland asked. "I know it sounds heartless, but the weaker the enemy's forces are before we make our move…"

Angel nodded. "I understand, Roland. I was thinking the same thing. There's still some stragglers of Sandman's forces around, though, so we'll have to get moving: we'll still be coming across some resistance."

"Fine by me," Scarlett said, her sword and her revolver at the ready. "Most of Sandman took his forces from mine. I look forward to punishing some of those treacherous dogs." She blinked at her own statement. "That didn't come out right, did it? Oh, God, I sound too posh for that!"

We all laughed, despite ourselves. But soon, the time for laughter would be over. The time for bloodshed was close, too close.

* * *

"Waaaagggghhhh!" I screamed as the Anchorman's attack sent me hurtling through the air towards him. These big, overly muscled sand-pirates liked to use anchors on chains as weapons, and a few also like to be like Scorpion from the old _Mortal Kombat_ games, using them almost as harpoons to fling us through the air, often towards them. All they were missing was a guttural snarl of 'GET OVER HERE!'

Everyone else was busy trying to fight off the survivors of Sandman's crew, even Angel, who intended to use her lightning projection purely as a last resort (in case she drained her Eridium reserves), and instead used an SMG with a grim expression. Once I reached the Anchorman, he swatted me to the ground, and chortled.

I felt the familiar sensation flow into me, for the first time for a long time, and I just let myself go. The world drained of ambiguity, and filled with simplicity. Everything was sharpened, and delineated. As the Anchorman swung his massive weapon down, I leapt to my feet and fired my Maliwan pistol, currently set to incendiary rounds, into one of the few weaknesses in his armour: just near the groin. Not actually at the groin, but because he had to walk, the armour needed to move there. But it also meant his femoral artery was, when attacked right, vulnerable. The fact that his crotch was on fire also helped.

As the Anchorman howled, I howled back, shooting round after round into the bastard, setting him on fire. As he slumped, I turned to face the rest of the battlefield, the flames silhouetting me. The battle had ceased, momentarily, with everyone staring at me. Alternative hypothesis confirmed: I was even more scary with flames at my back.

And for the memory of Krieg, I wanted to have an even hammier response before. For science, of course.

"I'M GONNA PUT MY PAIN INTO YOUR SOULS! FOR SCIENCE!" I bellowed, pointing at Sandman's pirates.

 **DOCTOR RICHARD SNYDER**

 **Chews Scenery, and Spits Science Out**

Eventually, one of the pirates said, "What the _fuck_ is wrong with this guy?"

"It's a long list, and we're short on time. Sorry," I apologised, before shooting him in the head. Shame to lose such an inquiring mind, but during battle, you should focus more on survival than inquiry. Less on wondering why one eats, and more on how to eat, as Douglas Adams would have put it(1).

As I shot at the enemy, I heard Hammerlock say to Gaige, "I say, so this is the infamous Sci-Zone?"

"Sure is, Hammerlock," Gaige said. The girl had a crush on Hammerlock, though unfortunately, she wasn't his type. One, she was young enough to be his granddaughter, and two, he was gay. Gaige knew this, and accepted it, but it didn't stop her from pining. "It's like a genie out of the bottle, if the genie was a mad scientist!"

"And without the whole three wishes thing," Roland said, crouching behind the shield of his currently-deployed Scorpio turret. I joined him. I was in the madness place, but I still put a premium on self-preservation. Angel was present too.

"Well, if the enemy wishes to die, and my allies wish to live, I grant them!" I said, with a predatory grin. I then shouted at them, "Hey, how many of you guys want to die? It's an experiment! You'll further the cause of science!"

Null hypothesis confirmed: no takers, although they wanted to kill me more, so I guess that is a triumph of sorts.

"You should've met this one Psycho who belonged to the Slabs," Roland said with a roll of the eyes, even as he hurled a singularity grenade at the sand pirates. "He wanted to be shot in the face. I heard Axton did the honours, so to speak."

"Aww…he would have been a great test subject!" I pouted.

Roland and Angel shared a look. Then, Angel shrugged, and used her sniper rifle to pick off another pirate. "We can't always get what we want, Ricky," she said, before firing again.

"Damn," I snarled. "I _knew_ there was a Rolling Stones song I wanted for my music player."

Scarlett, who was firing with aplomb at her treacherous former crew, gave me a glance, before shrugging. "The sad thing is," she said, as she whirled and decapitated one of the pirates who got too close, "you're nowhere near the weirdest person I met. Not even in the top ten.(2)"

"Really?" I asked, somewhat offended. As I shot another pirate, I said, "Must try harder."

* * *

We made better time after that, but just as we came to a lift, we found Nakayama waiting for us, a quartet of Loaders flanking him, while he had the anti-respawn shotgun. "You may be good at what you do," Nakayama said, "but I won't let you get to…"

"Phase-shift activated," Angel said quietly, her eyes flaring blue briefly. And the four Loaders turned to bring their weapons to bear on Nakayama.

"… _Shit_ ," he groaned, his tone a mixture of both fear and bitter resignation. His face twisted in anger, and he snapped, "Go on, do it!"

Angel looked to Roland, and then to me. By this point, I was out of the Sci-Zone, for the moment. She then said to Nakayama, "There's going to be changes at Hyperion soon. I suggest you go back and curry favour with Vice President Blake. Put down the gun, and I'll send one of the Loaders to escort you to the Fast-Travel station. I'll be in control of the Loader, though, so no funny stuff. Just remember, I let you live. Dad wouldn't have, even if you were his biggest fan."

Nakayama seemed about to protest, before thinking better of it. He placed the anti-respawn gun on the ground, and then began to scurry away, Angel sending the Loader after him. He shot glares at us as he left, but nothing else, thankfully for him. Roland took the anti-respawn gun, and put it safely away in his storage deck.

As we ascended, we heard the last remnants of battle peter out. It seemed we had gotten here either in the nick of time…or too late. When we saw the light stab out from the lighthouse, we knew it was the latter.

"Bugger," Scarlett said, with considerable understatement.

Suddenly, from the top of the lighthouse came a scream of jet engines. And clinging to a JET Loader that sped over us was none other than Jack. I saw him look down briefly, snarling. He didn't linger, with the JET Loader continuing into the distance, but he used a general broadcast over ECHO. " _Oh for fuck's sake…can't you guys get a hint? You know, DIE like normal people?_ "

"Language, Dad," Angel chided. Jack didn't offer any further response. I looked around the grounds of the lighthouse. It would have been considered idyllic, if it weren't for the bodies and broken Loaders. Enough Loaders were present still functioning. And some of those were JET Loaders. I used to think of them as the Loader equivalent of Starscream from those ancient _Transformers_ cartoons, except without the innate treachery.

"Phase-shift activated," Angel said again. While most of the remaining Loaders began fighting each other, the four remaining JET Loaders came up. "Okay, two to a Loader," Angel said. "Roland, you can carry Tina as well."

Angel and I took one, Hammerlock and Gaige took another (the former bearing proximity to a fangirl most stoically, while Gaige looked like she was about to pass out), Moxxi and Tim took a third, and Roland, Scarlett, and Tina took the last one.

"Is this safe?" Tim asked as the JET Loaders transformed, and began to rise into the air.

"Not at all," Angel said cheerfully. "Just hang on tight."

* * *

Angel flew slower than she could have: she wanted to make sure nobody fell off. But it was still a fast journey, clinging to the back of a flying Loader, with no parachute. Tina and Gaige whooped in enjoyment, but the rest of us just clung on for dear life.

We finally reached the area which the lighthouse had indicated, somewhere in Wurmwater, and not far from Scarlett's ship. Jack was already there, though he was jabbing at his ECHO communicator frustratedly. The Loader with Angel and myself landed first. "Helios Station isn't sending you anything anymore, Dad," Angel said.

"This is your doing," he snarled. It wasn't quite a question.

"Blake's, actually. He couldn't stop the Loaders you already sent down, but he could put a hold on your authorisation. Phase-shift activated, by the way," Angel said, her eyes flaring blue. The Loader turned its weapons on Jack.

Jack turned to us, and sneered. "You think I'm gonna give up? You don't know _Jack_." With that, he activated his holo-doubles. I had to admit, as pre-battle taunts were concerned, that was pretty good.

But before battle could be joined, we felt the ground shaking beneath our feet. "Oh dear," Scarlett said, deadpan. "I think I know what's about to happen. Leviathan is coming."

"That mythical creature?" Jack sneered. "Oh look at me, I'm so fucking…" And then, suddenly, something reared out of the sands. I stared at it. It was like a giant sandworm of the type we had seen all around the area. And suddenly, my earlier remark about Jack being chomped by a sandworm didn't seem so funny anymore.

"You and your big fucking mouth," I groaned, just before the creature lunged.

* * *

Amazingly, we didn't die when the Leviathan swallowed us. We found ourselves somewhere within the damn thing's vast digestive tract. The moment Jack picked himself up, he ran for a sphincter that probably doubled as a door within the Leviathan. But his holo-doubles remained, firing at us with lasers.

Tim evened the odds by sending his own decoys at them. Jack had sent more than Tim(3), but the Loaders Angel took control of were enough.

Eventually, the Loaders and Tim's decoys won out, and Roland said, "After him."

We had only been gone a few minutes, but when we heard a scream of fear, and a bellow, we knew that Jack had run into trouble.

Of those present, four of us found the bellow familiar. I was one of them, and Hammerlock was another. But I didn't expect Scarlett to be the third. Her good eye widened. "Could it be? Roscoe?"

"Roscoe?" I asked.

"My pet."

"Wait, wait, wait…you have…something like _that_ …as a pet?"

"Something like what?" Tina asked.

"Oh, you'd like it yourself, Tina," I muttered, remembering how one of her tea party guests was a varkid larva.

"Please tell me that's not what I think it is," Roland said. He was the other one present to recognise the noise.

"Sorry Roland, but I don't think today's your lucky day," I muttered, as we finally made our way into a vast chamber, perhaps some sort of stomach, given the pools of bile and digestive acid.

The chamber was just the right size for the occupant of the chamber. We couldn't see Jack, but the vast creature inside could have already killed him. Quadrupedal, with a lot of eyes, a yonic mouth that would have had Freud crap his pants, and bigger than an elephant. But it had one of those things, a howdah or whatever it was called (you know, those things they used to ride elephants back on Earth), and it looked ready for battle.

"Roscoe!" Scarlett yelped, overjoyed. "I knew you wouldn't have died so easily from the Leviathan!"

 **ROSCOE**

 **Try Having THIS Pet Sit On Your Lap!**

"Aw, that's sweet," came an acidic tone. Sitting up in the howdah was none other than Jack, looking a little the worse for wear. But he was still sneering down at us. "But he's not your pet anymore, sugar-bumps. He's _mine_." He then looked down at the beast he was riding. "Roscoe? **_Kill_**."

 **CHAPTER 10 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **Well, finally some action! And the beginning of the final battle against Jack! Only this time, he's using Roscoe instead of the Destroyer. And letting Nakayama go isn't going to bite them in the arses…right?**

 **By the way, in case you're wondering what 'yonic' means, well, to put it delicately, yonic is to women what phallic is to men. It's not a commonly used term, especially compared to phallic. If you still don't have a clue, look up the word on Wiktionary: that's probably the safest site to look it up on. It's not the only Pandoran beast to have a yonic mouth: after all, that's what the skags have, a fact that Tannis alludes to very obliquely while you're fighting digi-structed skags during the Raid on Digistruct Peak (she says that their mouths enhance their Freudian symbolism).**

 **As I finish this chapter, I'm installing (having bought it cheaply in a physical store) the Pre-Sequel. I'm also strongly considering a new** ** _Borderlands_** **fanfic, separate from** ** _The Ballad of Ricky and Angel_** **. I'm going to play some of the Pre-Sequel first, in order to get a feel for Jack's pre-** ** _Borderlands 2_** **persona, because it will be, hopefully, an excellent what-if story: what if Jack wasn't as big a prick? What if he and Angel together helped the Vault Hunters in opening the first Vault? For their own reasons, but still for better reasons than they did? I think there's a lot of mileage in a story like that, though I'm not sure whether it has been done. It's still percolating in my head, and I want to play some of the Pre-Sequel first.**

 **I don't know when the next update will be for this story, but the final chapters are on the way. At the moment, I'm guessing maybe two chapters, plus an epilogue to lead into the next story. Of course, this story will be shorter than** ** _Hooked on a Feeling_** **, but the next story in the saga, tentatively titled** ** _Welcome to the Jungle_** **, will probably be longer, partly because it combines two of the DLC campaigns.**

 **I was pleasantly surprised to learn recently that Yasemin Arselan, the woman hired to play Lilith in the Angel-style live action footage of Lilith in** ** _Borderlands 2_** **, is Australian! Go Aussie! :D**

 **1\. In** ** _The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy_** **novel, Adams posits that civilisation goes through three phases: Survival, Inquiry, and Sophistication, or the How, Why, and Where phases. Applied to eating, it comes to three questions:** ** _How do we eat?, Why do we eat?_** **, and** ** _Where shall we have lunch?_**

 **2\. Keep in mind that Scarlett had Herbert on her crew, not to mention that one guy (can't remember his name offhand) that you have to douse in sauce and feed to worms, all while he's screaming charming things like using your lungs to house his children or something. Scarlett's probably seen far weirder than Snyder in the depths of the Sci-Zone.**

 **3\. In the final boss battle, if memory serves me correctly, he only sends out two or three. However, in order to make Jack more of a threat, I decided to give him more, about a dozen.**


	12. Chapter 11: The Conquest of Three Beasts

**CHAPTER 11:**

 **THE CONQUEST OF THREE BEASTS**

"Roscoe!" Scarlett yelled again, this time in heartrending concern.

"Ah, ah, ah!" Jack said, waggling a finger chidingly, as Roscoe bellowed, and charged for us. As we scattered, he continued. "Nisha told me about this little pet of yours. And thankfully, Nakayama had a little something-something for bringing a Rakk Hive to heel. I brought it along, just in case. Have to admit, Scarlett, you have style and pizazz. But frankly, that's all you have left."

"Damn!" Scarlett snarled.

I stared at her as we ran around the edge of a pool of acid. "How the hell did you come to have a fucking _Rakk Hive_ as a pet?!" I demanded of Scarlett.

"Long story, and now's not the time!" Scarlett snapped back. Rakks began emerging from the creature, and as she fired at them, she said, "Once this is all over, how about we sit down to a nice cup of tea and talk about that, yeah?"

Tina, who was nearby, was staring in rapture at the beast. "Wow, that's a Rakk Hive? Dayum, girl, you have some good taste in pets! Shame we hafta kill it, though."

Scarlett pursed her lips, before nodding. "I'll try to get through to him, but if Jack's got him under control…I understand." She dashed away, yelling at her former pet. I thought she was mad. I thought she was even more so when she began climbing up the side of Roscoe. Her hook helped her immensely, though.

"Doctor!" Roland yelled. "Tina! Here!" He had deployed his Scorpio turret nearby, and we crouched behind the forcefield as it shot at the Rakks. Roland was using an assault rifle to mow them down. I saw that Angel was with Gaige and Hammerlock, while Tim and Moxxi fended off Rakks together. The Loaders that Angel controlled were also present.

Suddenly, there was a yelp of surprise and pain, and Jack was ejected from the howdah on Roscoe. One of the Loaders, controlled by Angel, intercepted him in mid-air. Judging by the scream of pain that he emitted, he had hit them hard, and was apparently unconscious, or semi-conscious. The Loader then carefully restrained the President of Hyperion.

Scarlett, however, had seemed to regain control over Roscoe. She chucked an electronic device from the howdah. "Sonic control. Bastard. Anyway, we have bad news, good news, and great news. Bad news is, Leviathan swallowed us. Good news is, I think it's taking us to the treasure chamber. Great news is, Roscoe's back to normal."

The Rakk Hive gave an affirmative bellow, before kneeling. Scarlett then hopped out of the howdah, and carefully slid down the Rakk Hive's body, before approaching Jack. "Bastard," she sneered, raising her revolver to his masked face. Then, she thought better of it. "Actually, let's see what you're hiding beneath that mask, Handsome Jack."

Without any further ado, she tore the mask from Jack's face, only for her eyes to widen, and for her to gasp in horror. I walked around the Loader, and I stared. I had seen the pictures, thanks to Angel. But to see the results…

"Fuck…" I murmured. The scarring, if anything, had gotten worse since those photos were taken. The Vault logo was like a suppurating brand, a burn wound allowed to fester. This was the true face of Jack, scarred by an obsession with the Vaults.

Hammerlock had been in the middle of a monologue about the difficulty of domesticating Rakk Hives when he heard me. Everyone gathered around Jack, and stared at his scarred face.

His eyes flickered open with a groan, and I stared at the ruin of his left eye. The other eye focused on Scarlett and myself, and then at the mask that Scarlett was still holding. " _Give me back my_ _ **face**_ ," he hissed in a low, dangerous tone.

Scarlett looked at the mask in her hand, and appeared to consider it, before suddenly throwing it contemptuously into one of the pools of acid. With a hiss, it bubbled and dissolved.

"What the hell did I ever do to you?!" Jack screamed, thrashing in the arms of the Loader.

"Killed my crew, got my friend to kneecap me, brainwashed my pet…" Scarlett said, counting offences off on her fingers. "Oh, and interrupted the wedding. I told you, didn't I, to let them have their fun. You could NOT wait until the reception, could you?"

"Hey, she's my daughter, and as her father, it's my responsibility to…"

Suddenly, his daughter was there, slapping him hard around the face. "Oh, _fuck off_ , Dad," Angel snarled angrily. "That could have been the happiest day of my life. But you don't want me to BE happy, do you? You want me on a short leash, and Ricky six feet under, along with the population of Sanctuary! You want everyone on Pandora to treat you like a god! You're not a god. You're not a hero. Hell, you're not much of a man. You call yourself Handsome Jack, but look at you. You're ugly inside and out. You're obsessed with the Vaults and power over everyone. You think you're better than the bandits you claim to be wiping out, but the only difference between them and you is the scale of your atrocities. Oh, and you're uglier underneath the mask."

A feral bellow ripped out of Jack, and he tried to wrench himself away from the Loader. Saliva lashed out of his distorted mouth. He looked like he wanted nothing more than to tear Angel's throat out with his teeth, like a rabid dog. "I say," Hammerlock asked, peering at Jack. "Have you had your rabies shots, old chap?"

"Believe me, you wouldn't believe the amount of jabs I had to get after turning into this guy," Tim said.

"I could, sugar," Moxxi said. "After we broke up, I had to get so many vaccinations…let's just say that I'm not quite THAT much of a masochist."

Tim stepped forward, and then wrenched Jack's bracelet off him, as well as the pocketwatch. He then wiped his arms from foamy flecks of saliva that got onto him. "That's it!" Jack snarled. "Take everything I own, like the bandits you are! Haven't you done enough to me?"

"No. Not yet," Roland said, crossing his arms and glaring at Jack. "New Haven. Fyrestone. Liar's Berg. All those people. You killed many in Sanctuary too with your bombardments." He activated his storage deck, and brought out the anti-respawn gun.

"No!" Angel yelled.

"Why not?" Roland snapped back. "This man enslaved you! He murdered all those people, and you want him to live?"

"Of course not!" Angel said. "I just haven't undone the sabotage I did to that weapon yet. You don't want to die from the booby-trap, do you?"

Roland blinked, before he handed the gun to her, rubbing the back of his head sheepishly. "Fair point."

"I knew it," Jack sneered. "I thought something might be up with that gun. Why did you seem so eager to piss me off back on Scarlett's ship? That's what got me thinking. That's why I gave the gun to Nakayama."

I scoffed. "Of course. Anyone's expendable in your book. Except yourself."

"I'm the hero, of course I'm indispensable."

I shook my head. "Charles de Gaulle once said that graves the world over are filled with so-called indispensable men," I retorted.

"Okay, it's ready," Angel said, holding out the gun for Roland to take. But before he could take it, we heard a roar, and then, a wave of liquid smashed into us, sweeping us out…

* * *

For how long we were swept away in the torrent, I don't know. It wasn't acid, but it sure as hell stank. We were eventually flying through the air, screaming (or in the case of Roscoe, bellowing), before landing in an undignified heap.

As I got, shakily, to my feet, I realised we were in a dank, dark cave. I thought I saw Leviathan in front of us, the sandworm screeching at us, until it withdrew into an even larger mass.

I stared at it. Whatever it was, I couldn't quite classify it into any real category of animal I knew of. It was vast, had great flippers for hands, and strange blue, glowing growths over its body that could have been mistaken for eyes. It could have been some vast creature of an alien sea…well, it was. But the sea it swam in was dry and sandy.

This was the Leviathan.

 **LEVIATHAN**

 **What, You Were Expecting Something Small?**

Battle was soon joined. The damn thing kept summoning sandworms to help it. I was batted away by a massive blow from one of its flippers, but that was enough to trigger the Sci-Zone.

I yelled at the Leviathan, pointing at it, "I will take great pleasure in vivisecting you! For science!"

 **DOCTOR RICHARD SNYDER**

 **Did Anyone Order A Mad Scientist, With A Large Side of Ham?**

It was Hammerlock who first discovered that the blue patches were weak points of some kind. We concentrated our fire on it, with Angel setting the Loaders to basically be the tanks of the group. Jack was held by one of them, until it was swatted away, along with him, by another blow from the flipper of the Leviathan. The Loader collapsed, all over Jack.

I won't bore you about the details of the battle. Frankly, I don't know how to write fights that well. Moxxi said that it was like one of her better lovers: long, hard, and giving a good workout that left you sore by the end.

But the Leviathan gave a mighty screech, and eventually fell down. The toll was surprisingly low. The Loaders had been destroyed, and, unfortunately for Scarlett, Roscoe, who had defended his owner valiantly, had been battered to death by the Leviathan. The rest of us had various injuries, Roland cradling a broken arm, and Tim looking like he had a concussion.

I was still in the Sci-Zone when I began counting the others. I frowned. "Where's Jack?" I asked.

Angel, who was checking the wreckage of the Loader holding him, got the answer. Suddenly, he was there, his arm around her neck, held in front of him as a shield, a gun in his hand. He sneered at us as he aimed the gun. At me. "Got any last words, Dick?"

I prepared to dodge, until I saw Angel's eyes flare blue. And I smiled. "Yeah. Well, a question, really. You know what happens to a douchebag when it gets struck by lightning?"

"A what?" Jack demanded, just before electricity blasted out of Angel, sending him convulsing to the ground, sparks crawling over him.

"The same thing that happens to everything else," Angel said. She then kneeled, and punched him in the face. If he wasn't unconscious before, he was now. "I held back. Didn't want him respawning at a New-U station." She panted, slightly, and tapped the boost button on her injector.

"Here," Gaige said, directing her Deathtrap to pick up Jack. "Do we kill him now?"

"We'll do it at Sanctuary. We'll make sure people see that he's dead," Roland said. He then tapped the anti-respawn gun. "And we'll do it with this."

* * *

I came out of the Sci-Zone as we began walking through the chamber. We even walked along one of Leviathan's flippers to get to a vast doorway. And through that doorway…

"Whoa," Tina said, her eyes wide.

"Is that a ziggurat?" I asked.

"Ask Tannis," Roland said.

"Well, might as well take some photos for Tannis, then," Moxxi said. "I mean, this looks like an Eridian ruin, doesn't it?"

That it did, the stones dark with the distinctive glowing purple lines of Eridian architecture. Even I had seen photos from Tannis' files, as we worked on her Siren power projection device.

We made our way to the top of the ziggurat, finding a bunch of treasure chests present. Scarlett ran her hand along the top, her lips pursing pensively. There was a somewhat solemn look on her face as she did so. I noticed that she murmured Roscoe's name, quietly to herself. Clearly, the loss of her pet had hit her hard(1).

Eventually, she opened the chest, and smiled. "Good." She plucked out a grenade mod, an incendiary mod of some sort. She then descended the ziggurat. "I'll be back in a tick. I think Roscoe deserves a Viking funeral, yeah? Don't take it all."

We didn't. There were too many weapons for any of us to carry. It was decided that, with the exception of Moxxi, we would keep one weapon each from the cache, while Moxxi would take a portion of what money and Eridium was present. It would go towards the restoration of the Underdome. I got myself an explosive shotgun, an ancient but still sturdy Torgue weapon.

Eventually, Scarlett made her way back, pungent smoke following her. "Sorry about that," she said, climbing back to the top of the ziggurat. Her eyes were a bit red, and tears had been wiped from her eyes. "Now, where were we?"

The negotiations went well. Scarlett gave Moxxi more of the money and Eridium than we thought she would. Scarlett had enough money now to hire a crew, and enough weapons to arm them. "Of course, I'll have to find a way to get these weapons back and forth. My storage deck isn't that big. Oh well. I'll cross that bridge when we come to it."

* * *

As it turned out, the Leviathan's Lair had an exit that was right near Oasis. Somewhat anticlimactic, considering. We parted ways with Scarlett, leaving her to figure out the logistics of carrying the weapons that formed the bulk of Captain Blade's famous treasure out. We, however, had a perhaps greater burden. The supine body of Handsome Jack, still alive.

But we were going to make sure that he didn't stay that way.

 **CHAPTER 11 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **Well, we're nearing the end. Sorry to rush through the Roscoe and Leviathan boss battles. I think this part of the story is nearing its conclusion, though.**

 **BTW, I've begun playing the Pre-Sequel. An annoying bug at the start aside (which seemed to be corrected when I got Steam to verify the game files), I'm actually enjoying it quite a bit. I don't really care about what some people are saying, that it feels like an expansion pack for** ** _Borderlands 2_** **. I'm enjoying it quite a bit. My main beef is how Lilith is treated in the framing story. I know I treated her in a similar fashion in** ** _Hooked on a Feeling_** **, but I was trying for consistency with the game, as well as to have someone react badly to Snyder.**

 **1\. Scarlett's reaction to Roscoe's death seems rather bland in the game, so I decided to make her a bit more emotional here about it, hence the Viking funeral.**


	13. Chapter 12: A Deal With the Devil

**CHAPTER 12:**

 **A DEAL WITH THE DEVIL**

A small crowd had gathered in what was to become the killing ground of Sanctuary. It was not far from Scooter's garage, near the edge of Sanctuary(1). A pair of pillars were set up, and the prisoners tied to them.

We were told of an unexpected guest who was coming to witness the execution. And after considerable debate and discussion about who would do the deed, I decided to do take the admittedly dubious honour myself. In a way, I had started it all, when a simple message from Angel had Jack sending me to die. It was time for me to end it.

Roland. Lilith. Mordecai. Brick. Maya. Axton. Gaige. Salvador. Zer0. Moxxi. Tim. Hammerlock. Tina. Scooter. Tannis. Zed. Marcus. Claptrap. Vault Hunters and Sanctuary citizens old and new, waiting for the end. For me to kill Jack and Nisha.

Angel gave me the anti-respawn gun. I then looked at the prisoners. The condemned. Nisha looking both resigned and defiant. Jack, only now regaining consciousness, looking the worse for wear. He looked up, and his eyes met mine. And then, the gun in my hand. He looked up at me, and said, quietly, "Is this it? You're going to kill an unarmed man in cold blood, Richard?"

It was the first time in years that he had called me Richard. I couldn't remember the last time he had called me that. I nodded solemnly. "So many people want you dead, Uncle John," I said. "All of those in Sanctuary have more than one reason to want you dead. Some have more than one. I wanted to do this because…I want to know that Angel is safe. And she won't be safe by any stretch until you're dead."

"Are you kidding me?" Jack asked wearily. "There are others who covet Sirens, Richard. You think you can keep her safe from all of them?"

"I can keep her safe from one of them, at least. That's all that matters."

As I raised the anti-respawn gun, a voice yelled "Stop!"

As a grin bloomed on Jack's face, I whirled to find a dapper man, thin and slender, in a suit, walking towards me from out of the small crowd. His blonde hair had two vaguely devilish points, and his thin face had a small beard. I knew him, though I wish I didn't. Jeffrey Blake, Vice President of Hyperion.

 **JEFFREY BLAKE**

 **Better the Devil You Know…**

"What's wrong?" I groaned.

Blake snapped his fingers, and a surveyor drone zoomed overhead. I thought, for a moment, he was about to try something. But the surveyor did nothing but hover, its camera focused on Jack and Nisha.

"This is broadcasting to the Board," Blake said. "Jack, you have cost Hyperion a great deal of money, time, and resources. Taming Pandora is all very well, but you overextended yourself. The Board has not infinite patience, and Hyperion hasn't got infinite resources for you to squander. Therefore, we are allowing this. You are no longer President of Hyperion. I am."

"Like hell you are, Jimmy!" Jack snarled.

"It's Jeffrey, _John_ ," Blake retorted. He then looked at me. "Get on with it, please? Time is money."

I nodded, before I said to Jack. "Any last words? And make them quick."

Jack seemed like he was about to launch into a ranting speech, before he merely sneered at me. "I'll be keeping a place in Hell warm for you, Dick."

I turned to Nisha. "And you?"

She rolled her eyes. "Just get on with it."

I nodded, before I raised the anti-respawn gun. First, I shot Jack, closing my eyes so that I didn't have to witness the event. Then, I did the same to Nisha. I turned away before I opened my eyes again, not wanting to look at what I had done to them. Sure, they were amongst the most evil people on Pandora. But this was the sort of handiwork I didn't want to see.

The crowd parted to let me through, and I handed the anti-respawn gun to Roland. Angel followed me. And together, we made our way to Moxxxi's, even as the first cheer erupted from some of those gathered.

* * *

It was strange, I reflected as I sat at a table in Moxxxi's. After all this time, you'd think I'd be overjoyed at Jack's death, just like many in the audience I had for killing him.

But I wasn't. I felt no joy or elation. Hell, I felt no relief, which is what I thought I would be feeling. I just felt tired and empty.

I looked up, and found that same lost look, that strange and terrible bleakness, echoed in Angel's own eyes. She had just witnessed her own father's death.

I remembered when Jack called me Richard, for the first time in a long time. And the last time, now. In a way, that had cut more deeply than any insult or threat that he had made.

Moxxi, without a word, brought us drinks, having gotten back to her bar not long after we did. She then sat next to us, along with Tim. It was eerie to see Tim's face, as I had just killed the man it was based off. Tim was shaken. Probably seeing Jack's head get blown off have him some sort of existential shock. It was like witnessing his own death.

And how did Moxxi feel about the man who had once been her husband? I heard that she had killed two of her previous husbands (admittedly, they deserved it), and she was still on good terms with her third (Marcus of all people). But even so, what had there been between them? Had there been love? Did Moxxi regret what could have been?

We sat there, in silence, drinking. Even as outside, we could hear celebrations beginning. I thought of the end of _Return of the Jedi_ , when the Emperor was vanquished, and the Rebellion everywhere celebrated. But in real life, it doesn't work like that. Killing a tyrant doesn't guarantee the end of a war.

And the four of us had personal connections to said tyrant. Angel was his daughter. Moxxi had been his wife. Tim, of course, had been his body double. And I had called him Uncle John.

* * *

We only drank the one drink, so we decided to leave for the Crimson Raiders HQ. In the streets, people were dancing and drinking. " _Sic semper tyrannis!_ " one intellectual citizen of Sanctuary howled.

When we got to the Raiders HQ, Tannis waved us upstairs. We found Blake there, holding forth in a discussion (it wasn't quite heated enough to be called an argument) with Roland and Lilith. Mordecai was sitting to one side, looking bored, while Brick stood in a corner, doing what he did best when fighting wasn't required: looming menacingly.

"…is non-negotiable," Roland said. "Under Interplanetary Law Codes, the Warrior would count as a Weapon of Mass Destruction. Obviously, we're not saying that Sanctuary should have it. Nor are we saying that the Vault should remain buried. But neither Hyperion nor Sanctuary, nor any other company should be allowed to access any Vault confirmed to have a huge-ass alien killer. Atlas made that mistake with the Destroyer."

"True," Blake said. "But Atlas discovered the first Vault on Promethea. They didn't really do the research, whereas Hyperion did. Or rather, Jack. He was the one who manipulated you, with the help of Angel." He finally noticed. "And speak of the Angel, and she shall appear."

"Blake," Angel said, giving him a polite, but curt, nod.

"And Doctor Snyder, too. You know, between you two and the Vault Hunters, you have cost Hyperion a lot of money," Blake said, albeit with a tight smile. It was Jack who spent that money, after all, and he had acknowledged it publicly.

Even so, it did well to be wary of the guy. Rumour had it that when his department and another department were potentially scheduled for cutbacks, he killed the head of the other department (tourism, I think, while he was in charge of mercenary relations), presumably hiring an assassin. The two departments merged.

And now, he was President of Hyperion. Blake was a dangerous man with a dangerously incisive mind, but Angel had reassured me that he was also a pragmatist.

"In any case, there are some further conditions," Blake said. "The Vault Key is virtually indestructible. In addition, it is virtually ready to be used. It was originally kept in three segments. I think it should be split again. One piece apiece for Sanctuary and Hyperion. As for the third piece, we need a neutral third party who is capable of keeping it safe and secret."

That would be a tricky prospect. Discounting bandits or members of rival corporations, there probably wouldn't be a neutral third party left on Pandora. Jack had probably killed them all, or else caused them to join the Crimson Raiders.

"TK Baha?" Roland asked, looking at the others.

"Gesundheit," I said.

Everyone present looked askance at me. "What?" I asked.

"TK Baha…he's an old friend. Not actually a member of the Crimson Raiders. It'd be a bit hard to be, given that he's dead. Well, undead."

"Wait, he's a zombie?" I asked incredulously.

"Very long story involving Dr Zed's evil brother and a zombie plague," Lilith said.

"And unfortunately, Mr Baha is not the right candidate," Blake said. "For all his brilliance in weapon design, the man was a blind cripple in life, and was murdered by bandits before his resurrection."

"What about Scarlett?" I asked. "She's only interested in her own goals, and once she gets a decent pirate crew, she may be able to defend it."

Blake frowned, before nodding. "I'll consider it. In any case, now that you and Angel are here, I think I should tell you about a vital part of the treaty we are negotiating. Technically speaking, both of you are still Hyperion employees, though Angel is not actually registered as an employee, but as equipment." A faint sneer of distaste wrinkled Blake's lips. "Thankfully, your presence in Control Core Angel is not necessary, Angel. Already, my people have been working around that. Jack at least had the foresight to make the most vital systems redundant. Given that you have done so much for both Hyperion and the Crimson Raiders, I have decided on your new roles. You will be representatives for Hyperion within Sanctuary, ambassadors if you will, as well as our own Vault Hunters. The official title will be Special Sanctuary Liaisons. If concerns come up, like new Vaults being discovered, or some idiot deciding that they want revenge, then you will be my troubleshooters, probably with an emphasis on shooting." A sardonic smile twitched at his features.

"Don't we get a say in this?" I asked.

"Yes. What sort of gun or shield would you like for your bonus?" Blake asked, his smile only intensifying a little.

* * *

As far as roles one could be shanghaied into, I guess it could have been worse. Really, our roles, judging by what Blake said, were mostly honorary. We would have to act given the events he pointed out, and we would probably have to communicate with Blake regularly. But if peace between Sanctuary and Hyperion was actually promised, then it was a small price to pay.

As Angel and I went to the quarters, I thought about her, and our future together. I looked at the Eridium injector hooked onto her pants (and tried not to focus on how callipygian she was becoming, now she was outside Control Core Angel). When I had managed to get her outside Control Core Angel, and had her in a life-support tank, she had accused me of caging her, just like her father. When she realised that she could potentially be free of confinement forever, however…well, I'm sure that was probably the best day of her life.

But the injector was still a leash of sorts. Not one I was holding, but it was still a burden. It occurred to me that, if Sirens could be used as an Eridium catalyst (Jack was using her to supercharge the Vault Key, after all), what was to stop her body from producing Eridium on its own? What could I do to make sure that the injector wasn't needed?

When we reached our rooms, I went into mine, and began writing through the night. I felt the familiar feeling of the Sci-Zone push at me. For the first time outside of battle, I welcomed the feeling.

Even as the world drained of morality and ambiguity and complexity, I knew Nisha was wrong. I would never lose control and destroy the one thing that mattered most to me in the universe. As the thoughts of Siren anatomy and physiology resolved themselves in my head, and I knew where to begin, I said, quietly, recalling the words I had shouted at Jack in Control Core Angel not so long ago, "Not for science. _For her_."

 **DOCTOR RICHARD SNYDER**

 **Not For Science. For Love.**

* * *

" _You may now kiss the bride. Passionately._ "

It was a bit embarrassing, doing this with an audience. But Angel, despite her nervousness, took the lead. After that whole debacle with Scarlett, it was Moxxi who offered her services. She wasn't a celebrant, but a Loader she had modified, Innuendobot 5000, had, for some bizarre reasons, qualifications as a marriage officiant. I'm not sure why, and I'm not sure I wanted to know.

We were holding the marriage ceremony in the same area where, only a few days before, I had killed Jack. Scarlett had been invited, along with Shade, and pretty much all of Sanctuary, pride of place going to the Crimson Raiders. This time, Lilith was bridesmaid, though Hammerlock was my best man once more. Tim took his place, once more, effectively being Angel's father, handing her over to me, and Tina was the flower-girl again. And this time, it went off without any interruptions.

"I always cry at weddings. Sniff!"

Well, except for one. Claptrap, as usual, knew how to fuck up a moment. But he was only a relatively minor impediment to the big day.

As we broke off our kiss, we shared a smile, especially as a wave of applause hit us. I looked at them all. Strange, how they cheered a former Hyperion employee and a woman who had been forced to cause the deaths of many they had known.

But things change. And hopefully, for the better. Hopefully, this would be the beginning of the rest of our lives.

 **CHAPTER 12 ANNOTATIONS:**

 **Nearly at the end. Jack and Nisha are dead, with Krieg and Steve avenged! This is the final numbered chapter. But yes, Snyder and Angel have gotten hitched, at long last, and without any (noteworthy) interruptions!**

 **This isn't the end of the Ballad of Ricky and Angel, though. The epilogue will show that…**

 **1\. This is obviously meant to be the place where Athena was being held for execution at the beginning of** ** _Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel!_**


	14. Epilogue: Unexpected ECHOs

**EPILOGUE:**

 **UNEXPECTED ECHOS**

In the days that followed since we accepted Blake's offer and Angel and I got married, life sort of settled back to normal. Well, as normal as one can get on Pandora, in a flying city. Moxxi was sent by Tannis to scout out some remote area, and Tina and Tim went along with them. They were practically family now, which made Tina (in a rather scary thought) the adopted sister of Scooter and Ellie. Then again, I liked Tina more than I liked Scooter or Ellie.

Claptrap got over the death of his erstwhile pal Steve rather quickly, but he decided to take a vacation from Sanctuary. Where he went, I don't know (and I hope to not see him for a long time). The other Vault Hunters, however, were somewhat more subdued regarding Krieg. And I have to confess, I did feel like I let the Psycho down. He had saved my life during the fight against Boom-Bewm. But with Jack dead, and the Vault of the Warrior left alone, life went on.

Lilith and Roland's relationship improved, and she divided her time between Sanctuary and her lair as the Firehawk in Frostburn Canyon. And we became better friends. Having three Sirens as friends was more than I could ever hope for. And what was more, they were, to a degree, willing subjects for tests, as long as they were non-invasive. And even as I shed more light on the Sirens, more questions popped up. It was frustrating, but in a good way. You know, how science should be. It's not just about finding answers, but asking, or learning, interesting questions.

Maya divided her time between Sanctuary and Overlook, a task she shared with Gaige. Between the two of them, they began getting the town, once affected by Jack's predations and mining, back on its feet. I learned of another Dave living there, and one who deserved Jack's appellation of Dave the Douchebag. It turned out that the townsfolk needed my cure for skull-shivers, but events prevented them from getting any. I met with Karima, the current mayor of the town, who stuttered quite a bit(1). She was quite nice, though she did arrange for Dave the Douchebag to be hit, 'accidentally', by a mortar shell while they were testing a shield for the town. Hyperion might not be after them now, but bandits were another matter, and a shield helped.

Zer0 often went off by himself, to do tasks on his own. He only spoke of them if he thought we would find them interesting, or amusing. Like the malfunctioning Hyperion Loader he met in the Eridium Blight, Mal. Or Dr Zed's skrakks. Long story there.

Axton, Mordecai, and Salvador went to Lynchwood, and cleaned up the town. Axton would stay at the town at the behest of Nisha's former deputy, Winger, while Mordecai and Salvador went off to the Dust to help Ellie provoke a gang war between the Zafords and the Hodunks. Mordecai's new bird, Talon, was proving to be every bit as good a partner as Bloodwing.

Brick returned to leading the Slabs, Jack and Nisha's corpses in tow. I believe they now have pride of place at the front of their HQ, just like the people Nisha hung in Lynchwood.

Scarlett, perhaps a bit wiser for her experiences, has managed to get a new crew, and still terrorizes Wurmwater. Her share of the treasure proved more than enough to arm herself. We decided that, if we were ever to visit Oasis again in the near-future, we would try to steer clear of each other. Shade, meanwhile, had jumped at the chance to stay in Sanctuary, at least for the time being. But he was considering taking over his grandfather's old museum at Prosperity Junction, so I heard.

Angel and I were still viewed with some small suspicion on the streets of Sanctuary, even more so now that we had an official position in Hyperion. But even so, the fact that we had killed Jack, along with Nisha, gave us some cred. The wedding had also gone a long way to help Sanctuary's feelings towards us turn around.

And my ideas for helping Angel become independent, with the help of Dr Zed, worked. It took a lot of work, research on the three Sirens, and several operations, but Angel was no longer reliant on the injector. Instead, her body actually produced Eridium from within her bones, effectively filling her blood with it. She would probably still need an injection if she depleted the reserves in her blood, but we had some syringes ready with her.

And we were husband and wife. I still found it hard to get over. She actually kept her old name, though. She was still Angel Clarke. And when I asked her why, she said, "It's the only good thing I have left from my father. Except for memories." And I could understand that.

Of course, the peace couldn't last.

* * *

It was two months since the fall of Jack, when Tannis summoned us all to her. Gaige and Maya were here, and so were Roland and Lilith. "Thank you all for coming," Tannis said insincerely. The only times she thanked me with any sincerity was when I shared the results of my investigation into Sirens. "Now, I've gathered you here today because my researches, and Moxxi's own investigations, have borne fruit. I, Doctor Patricia Tannis, have discovered the location of a new Vault."

I looked at Angel, before turning back to Tannis. "Another one? One not filled with tentacles and disappointment, hopefully?" I asked wryly.

"Yes, yes, another one!" Tannis said impatiently. "And it is not housing an alien entity as far as I know! I'm getting better at decrypting the Eridian language. Unlike the Vault of the Destroyer or the Vault of the Warrior, this one is definitely another weapons and technology cache like that on Promethea, or the one on Elpis. The treasure cache of one of the greatest Eridian warriors alive, apparently. The writings say that he is willing to give his weapons to those who are deemed worthy, by the chosen warrior of Pandora spilling the blood of its greatest coward."

I looked at Angel. "Should we get the phlebotomy kit? I mean, if it will help opening the Vault…"

"What?" Gaige asked. "Rich, you're no coward! Or at least you're not the greatest coward."

"True…" I muttered. "Maybe I should contact Blake and see if he has bags of Jack's blood left in storage instead."

"Less inanity, more intelligence!" Tannis snapped irritably. "Already, though, there's an interest in the potential new Vault. I believe Torgue has built an arena in the area directly above the Vault, which was where an ancient arena once was, apparently. I'm going to notify any interested Vault Hunters via ECHO later today, but I thought I would let you know first."

"Thanks, Doctor," Angel said with a smile. "But where is it?"

"The Knight's Arsenal," Tannis said. "At least, that's what it's called according to the Eridian writings. It's called some inane name by the locals, the Big Crater or something."

"I'd better go and notify Blake," Roland said. "Under the terms of the treaty, we'll have to share this." He didn't look happy about it, but Blake and Hyperion had been honouring agreements, so far. Best to reciprocate.

* * *

Later, we watched the ECHO broadcast. All over the world, people would be staring at their ECHO devices, and wondering what was going on. We were watching on the hologram projector in the Crimson Raider HQ's planning room. Tannis appeared, confident, though her speech could use some work.

" _Listen carefully, mouth-breathers of the world! I am Patricia Tannis, and I have found another Vault. As you may know, the opening of the first Vault five years ago triggered a chain reaction that revealed more Vaults on Pandora…_ "

Suddenly, a most extraordinary thing happened. The picture distorted, warped, and wobbled, a familiar corporate logo briefly appearing, and a strange roar came from the speakers. It resolved itself into a word, bellowed at the top of someone's lungs.

" ** _BOOOORRRRRRING!_** "

I stared at the extraordinary figure revealed when the picture stopped warping. Massively muscled, and grotesquely so. A huge mane of dark curly hair sprouted from the head, a thick moustache, mirrored sunglasses, and a red scarf on his head, along with headphones. There was no mistaking who this bastard mutant offspring between a wrestler and rockstar was. Mr Torgue, testosterone poisoning personified.

" _You don't wanna hear about that, Vault Hunters! You wanna hear about loot, pecs, and explosions! I'm Torgue, and I'm here to ask you one question, and one question only:_ _ **EXPLOSIONS?!**_ "

 **MR TORGUE HIGH-FIVE FLEXINGTON(** **2)**

 **Pandora's Answer to Saxton Hale and Steve Foxx(** **3)**

His image was consumed by footage of an explosion, and then, Tannis reappeared, understandably irate. " _Get off this ECHO frequency, you protein-guzzling buffoon! I'm trying to convey…_ "

Once more, the image flickered, and Torgue reappeared, snarling, " _That sentence had too many syllables._ _ **APOLOGIZE!**_ "

"What's wrong with the amount of syllables?" I asked.

"Shh!" Angel hissed, nudging me in the ribs.

I shook my head. As ridiculously neurotic as Tannis was, she was right about many things. And one of them was that many of those on Pandora, or with an interest in it, had, was a disinterest in words above maybe a primary school level. Torgue was entertaining at times, as I knew from many of his ECHOnet broadcasts, but he was also stupid. I remembered reading on the ECHOnet somewhere that he had sold a design for explosives-firing guns for twelve dollars and a high-five(4). That was moronic, albeit the sort of stylish stupidity that you could expect from Torgue, and that left you amused as well as shaking your head at his idiocy.

" _As I was saying_ ," Tannis began again, with a tone that she probably thought suggested long-suffering patience, but frankly came across as insufferable impatience, " _I've discovered that this Vault is buried in the centre of a large crater, and will only open, and I quote, 'once the Champion of Pandora feeds it the blood of the ultimate coward'._ "

Once more, the feed flickered, and went back to Torgue. " _We at the Torgue Corporation sincerely believe that THIS IS F***ING_ _ **AWESOME!**_ " I frowned. It was like the censoring beep had emerged from his mouth. Oh, wait, I did hear that his corporation did implant some profanity filter in his voicebox or something(5). " _It's so awesome that we're gonna set up a tournament to find this number one badass! If you want in, come to where the Vault is buried: in the Badass Crater of Badassitude!_ "

" _That's not what it's called…_ " Tannis protested.

" ** _THE BADASS CRATER OF BADASSITUDE!_** " Torgue bellowed.

When the feed finally switched back to Tannis, she just slumped, sighing heavily, resigned to the fact that the location had been renamed, and that her ECHO broadcast had been thoroughly derailed.

"Well…" I said as the ECHO broadcast finished. " _That_ just happened."

* * *

That, however, was by no means the strangest of the ECHO broadcasts we received that day. Of course, we had also received a directive from Blake that, to represent the interests of Hyperion, we would go. But that was expected. The Vault Hunters I had worked with before that whole Oasis mess, we were going with, save for the late, lamented Krieg, and the still-alive Axton, who was enjoying cleaning up Lynchwood. But this time, Lilith was coming, and Roland was staying behind. With Jack dead, one of the biggest dangers to her was over, and she was itching for some action. Blake said he would also send someone he could trust with keeping me safe. When I asked who, he merely said it was a surprise with a thin smile. Unctuous prick. But at least he had kept up his side of the bargain with Hyperion.

No, it was while Angel and I were beginning to pack. Then, the ECHO communicator on my wrist began to activate. No avatar or handle came up, instead being registered as anonymous.

Then, came the impossible.

" _HEYOOO!_ "

Angel and I looked at each other, startled. The word was Steve's famous cry…the voice, however, was Krieg's. "What the fuck?" I yelped.

" _Sorry_ ," came a familiar voice. A little raspy, but too-familiar all the same. That familiar, tired tone. " _The roommates wanted to say hello. Come on, big guy._ "

" _THREE ARE RIDING THE MEAT BICYCLE, JAUNDICE SACK!_ " came the familiar bellow of Krieg.

" _Heh. Close enough_ ," the quieter voice said. I recognised it as the saner voice Krieg occasionally used. " _It's been a while, hasn't it? I couldn't remember anyone else's ECHO codes but yours, Doc. It's a bit crowded upstairs._ "

" _HEYO!_ "

" _Yeah, keep it down, Steve_ ," sane Krieg said.

"If this is a joke, whoever you are," I said, anger beginning to well up inside me, "it's not a very good one!"

" _I AM A LIVING PUNCHLINE!_ " Krieg's voice roared.

" _Yeah, big guy's got it right on the money_ ," Sane Krieg said. " _If you could see me now, well, I am the punchline to a bad joke. I dunno exactly how it happened. Expect it's a long story. Of course, there's one thing I do remember that may help you believe me: the big guy saved you from Boom, and just before that, Boom was asking you what your last words were. You asked something about whether he had experienced an impromptu corpus callosotomy. You then told the big guy he had a good sense of comic timing._ "

"But Jack shot you with a fucking anti-respawn gun! How can you be alive?" Angel demanded.

" _IT WAS THE END, BUT THE MOMENT WAS PREPARED FOR!_ " Krieg bellowed(6).

" _Well, that was just one of the big guy's non-sequiturs_ ," Sane Krieg said. " _I don't really know. But I saw that ECHO broadcast. As it happens, I'm at the Crater. You guys coming?_ "

I looked at Angel, before saying, "Well, we were, but…"

" _Right. See you at the Fast-Travel station. We'll be waiting, right guys?_ "

" _WE WILL LEAVE THE SANDS OF THIS CRATER AWASH WITH BLOOD, URINE, AND CHEAP ALCOHOL!_ " Insane Krieg bellowed.

" _HEYOOO!_ "

And then, like that, the transmission ceased.

I looked at Angel, sharing a look of astonishment with her, and for the second time that day, after an unexpected ECHO, I muttered, "Well, _that_ just happened."

 ** _THE BALLAD OF RICKY AND ANGEL_** **WILL CONTINUE IN…**

 ** _WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE_** **.**

 **EPILOGUE ANNOTATIONS:**

 **And there you have it: the final chapter to** ** _You've Got to Hide Your Love Away_** **. I actually began this epilogue long before I finished the story proper. I only completed it after finishing Chapter 10, though, and edited it a bit to bring it in line with Chapters 11 and 12. And now, you have the cliffhanger (albeit not as big a one as the one I left with** ** _Hooked on a Feeling_** **) leading into my next story, which will probably be a while coming. I have other fanfics and stories I want to work on.**

 **Now, some of you might be thinking that bringing back Krieg is a bit of a copout. Others will be elated, and wondering how (and in what form) he, and Steve, are coming back. Well, it came to pass when I got a PM from one of my readers (I'm not naming names, unless they want to be named, as it is private correspondence), complaining about Krieg's untimely end. We got into a bit of an argument, but the suggestions they gave me about the New-U system actually got the old creative juices flowing. I found a way (not based on their suggestions, but on a separate matter) that I could not only bring Krieg and Steve back, but could also act as a hook for the** ** _Sir Hammerlock's Big Game Hunt_** **DLC adaptation. So I have to thank the reader for it. While I rarely take suggestions, I will try to listen to them. I've already told the person in question what I have in mind for** ** _Welcome to the Jungle_** **, particularly the bit involving** ** _Sir Hammerlock's Big Game Hunt_** **. The reaction was…interesting. You'll just have to wait and see, of course. How Krieg is coming back, you'll have to see, though I'm sure you can take an educated guess.**

 **Between this story's ending and the start of** ** _Welcome to the Jungle_** **, I'm beginning a new 'story' in the Ballad of Ricky and Angel. It's called, rather inventively,** ** _The Ballad of Ricky and Angel Files_** **. It's basically a collection of background material, little one-shot omakes, and so on. It will include a file Handsome Jack received about the Sci-Zone, Snyder's thoughts on his Vault Hunter comrades and others they have met, as well as Gaige interviewing Snyder for her ECHO Log. It will also introduce the character who will be hired by Blake to watch over Snyder and Angel. I think people can take a good guess as to who it is.**

 **Anyway, that's it for** ** _You've Got to Hide Your Love Away_** **, barring my numbered annotations. I hope you enjoyed it and** ** _Hooked on a Feeling_** **. They're not the most popular of my fanfics (my Harry Potter fanfics get more attention), but I'm glad some people enjoyed them. Thank you for reading!**

 **1\. I heard that Karima was given a stutter in her appearance in the Pre-Sequel because of some people wanting a positive character with a stutter, and were a bit annoyed that she lost it after the relevant mission in** ** _Borderlands 2_** **. I could be wrong, though. I therefore decided that she always has a stutter, but it's made worse by skull-shivers, and at times, she can control it better.**

 **2\. Yes, this is Torgue's full name, though you would know it if you've played the DLCs (namely the Tiny Tina one, and the Wattle Gobbler one).**

 **3\. Ironically, both characters are Australian. Saxton Hale is the boisterous CEO of Mann Co in the backstory of** ** _Team Fortress 2_** **, while Steve Foxx is a rather pugilistic and belligerent host and extreme stunts aficionado from the Australian comedy series** ** _Double the Fist_** **. Both are examples of extreme testosterone poisoning, and love nothing more than beating the crap out of anyone that pisses them off. Torgue would probably get along well with both of them.**

 **4\. As detailed in the second Headhunter DLC. Torgue's an idiot, but he had style. :P**

 **5\. Which he does, according to his announcements in the Badass Crater of Badassitude, apparently.**

 **6\. Krieg, in the game, yells "IT'S THE END, BUT THE MEAT WAS PREPARED!" I think it's after losing a duel. This, plus the line I actually used, is a reference to the Fourth Doctor's last lines in** ** _Doctor Who: Logopolis_** **: "It's the end. But the moment has been prepared for."**


End file.
